The Truth of The Red Robe: A New Generation
by SwagaliciousWillowbrook
Summary: 20 years post-Hawk Moth's defeat, our heroes' children are starting a new school year. When an event goes down, resulting in them becoming the next Team Miraculous, Ladybug, Kitty Noire, Scarlett Fox, Shellie, Queen Bee, Wingwoman, and Tropica must take down Red Robe, Seigneur Guepe, Shadowetta, and their team of Poisoner villains, with help from their own team of superhero allies.
1. Prologue: Not So Very Normal

Maddie Agreste held her head up high and still as her makeup artist Rose applied cherry red liquid lipstick to her lips as she kept her emerald eyes focused on her surroundings behind the changing sheet, trying not to flinch when Rose began painting the makeup onto her lips delicately and cautiously. It was 11:00 on a Sunday morning, and usually, at least for most people, they would be asleep. But not for her. Yet with her mother's fashion company being a booming success more than usual lately, she'd been doing more and more photoshoots and been waking up earlier, which, in her opinion, was not a good start to getting on schedule for the new school year that was starting tomorrow.

But at least she had her two best friends: Kara Lahiffe and Lillianna Couffaine-Lavillant. Ever since the three girls were babies, their mothers had always gathered up together once a week for the girls to have playdates, all in hope of the trio becoming future best friends one day. And man, were they correct. But Kara and Maddie had something special in their bond that neither had with Lilli; like it couldn't be replaced. Sure, they both loved Lilli and considered her as a sister to them, but they'd always been attached at the hip, literally. But after all, having your birthdays a month apart and your mothers being the best of friends since high school could make your own daughters repeat the cycle.

"Maddie, head a _little _more to the middle, then tilt it midway," Rose instructed, Maddie following her mother's friend's orders and doing as she was told. "No, wait. _This _way." she corrected herself as she made a hand gesture to the left and up, Maddie jerking her head another different direction once again. "No, no, no no, that way now." Rose shook her head as she pointed up towards the ceiling, its vibrant, shining lights gently stinging Maddie's eyes.

"Are you eventually gonna make a _real _final decision on where you want to to turn towards, Auntie Rose?" Maddie laughed. "We've been doing this for over ten minutes now, I'm already late for the first round of pictures."

"But your mom isn't here yet, is she?" Rose teased, a playful smirk lighting up her face as her blue eyes twinkled. "And... done! You look _perfect_." She said, emphasizing the compliment as she turned Maddie's chair around for the young girl to face herself in her vanity mirror, her squeezing her eyes shut to make the big reveal all the more dramatically exciting.

"Wow!" she exclaimed, a look of pure delight filling up her previously blank and emotionless face. "I _do _look perfect! Thank you, Auntie Rose!" She said as she got up, spinning around and admiring the flawless fishtail braid she wore in her dark blueish-black hair. "Now, I have to get to the next section to get those photos done."

"Better hurry, then," Rose agreed. "Those pictures won't take themselves, now, will they?"

"Nope!" Maddie exclaimed, throwing her purse over her shoulder as she plopped out of her seat and began to run for the front of the large building, all the way to where the photoshoot station itself was.

"Bye-bye, Maddie!"

"Bye-bye, Aunt Rosie!"

* * *

Kara Lahiffe fixed her long, auburn hair into a thick side braid as she double-checked her final look in the wall mirror in her bedroom.

"Oops, unbuttoned shirt," she pointed out, pressing the final button on her favorite buffalo plaid shirt into place to finish off her look. "There. _Now_, it's perfect."

She was then snapped out of her thoughts by her mother knocking on the door, who seemed rather eager to get started for their family to go to the amusement park for the day. Of course, Kailie, her younger sister of two years, had been waiting forever for this day to happen, and the day where they were finally going, every single thing was knocked out of whack, making the second oldest child out of the four children quite impatient.

"Ready to finally leave now, girl?" Alya asked, walking over to just behind Kara's mirror so she could see her through the mirror's reflecting. "You've been preparing for well over an hour and your sister's getting impatient."

"I'm ready now," the 15-year-old nodded, pressing her lucky hair clip with a music note made into it on her hair to smooth out any wispies, "I feel really lucky that we get to go to the park while Mads, Anna, and their families are cooped up inside a building and taking pictures all day Sunday."

"We definitely should be," Alya agreed with a chuckle, re-positioning her glasses so they would no longer look crooked. "And everything take a quadrillion times longer when Marinette runs late."

"Meh," Kara shrugged. "I don't have the best luck with being on time either. Remember that time in the seventh grade when I overslept and had to literally chase the bus down because you had work and Dad was out of town? That was a literal nightmare. Kailie lucked out big time by sleeping over and Maddie and Emma's, we all know they get places on time whenever Gorilla's driving them around."

"Oh, yeah!" Alya laughed out loud when remembering the day when Kara had overslept when Kailie messed with her alarm clock the night before, resulting in Kara being late to catch the bus and chasing it down for a half mile. "At least you got exercise."

"True," Kara agreed, rolling her eyes to the side to check out her alarm clock. "But, we should get going now. The amusement park won't be waiting for us forever."

* * *

Rebecca Kim scribbled her pen over a small sheet of paper, crossing out orders as she picked out trays filled with food for customers at the restaurant inside the Le Grand Paris. Even if she'd had her job as a waitress there ever since summertime of last year and got a fair amount of money from the job, sometimes, especially on weekends and the summertime days and nights, the minutes seemed to go by much slower compared to when the school year was in session.

Not to mention summertime soccer and watching her younger siblings, and just to top it all off with a cherry, the fashion club.

"Here you go," she said as she slid a strawberry milkshake down the bar-style table to a customer, keeping focused and trying to not be overwhelmed by the busy rush of the drink and lunch bar at rush hour. "Enjoy!" she smiled as her customer gladly took the milkshake from her, smiling back and walking over to an exit door and into the hotel's lobby.

"Everything going good?" she heard a voice ask from behind her, turning around to see her mother Chloe's best friend Sabrina standing here with a stressed look.

"Yep," Rebecca nodded in affirmation, brushing her hands together to dust them off. "You look worried, Auntie Sabrina, what's wrong?"

"Nothing?" Sabrina denied. "It's just that the restaurant can be so crowded around this time, and truth be told, it's quite overwhelming, so I just wanted to make sure you were doing okay. Not to mention your mother asked to to check on you." Sabrina quietly laughed.

"Classic Mom," Rebecca said. "Speaking of which, is she okay?"

"Um... is being short-tempered, looking like you're about to have a mental breakdown, and being crazed out by the sounds of little kids running around in the daycare room distracting her count as okay? Because if so, she's doing perfectly a-okay."

"Hmm... well, it depends," Rebecca pointed out, ready yet again to remind her mom's longtime best friend and partner in running the hotel a quick explanation on her mother's behavior and antics. "If things are going alright and there are no crises to handle, then she's fine. However, if everything's a nightmarish pandemonium and she's breathing heavily and has sweat dripping down her forehead, then you should likely check on her."

"Alright," Sabrina nodded, walking back out in order to head to the lobby and help her best friend. "Good luck."

Rebecca grinned happily and waved to Sabrina, but since her back was turned without knowing what Rebecca had done, but the young teen seemed too happy to mind.

"Now, back to making pies," Rebecca said to herself, bending down to the mini-fridge and grabbing out a bowl with plastic wrap over it, the bowl containing a rolled-up ball of unbaked pie crust inside. "Special of the day; Cookies 'n Cream Cluster."

"Ooh, I love that one!" A cheery voice squealed from behind her, Rebecca grinning with a giggle before turning her head around to face the girl who'd said it, immediately recognizing the voice of her best friend, Vivienne Kurtzberg, Sabrina's older daughter from her marriage to Nathaniel. "You're so good at making it, I know it'll be a hit today for sure!"

Rebecca beamed at her best friend's words, pulling herself back up and turning around to grin at her. "I _know _how much you love it, V," she rolled her eyes. "When I had a bunch of leftovers from Pie Friday, you ate three entire pies of that flavor whole, without any help."

"What can I say?" Vivienne shrugged, moving her arms to the side with an innocent smile on her face, her regal purple glasses' glitter shining under the chandelier and and all of the candles. "You've got serious talent when it comes to baking, Beck."

"And you've got serious talent when it comes to drawing, V," Rebecca smiled, placing a hand on her best friend's shoulder as she set down the wrapped bowl. "And trust me, I really mean it when I say that."

* * *

Jade Couffaine tapped the edges of her math book with a pencil as she thought about the math problem she tried to solve inside her head, feeling more challenged than usual in solving this problem.

"What's the answer to 100,000,000 divided by 29, times 666?" she asked herself out loud, rubbing her temple with two of her fingers anxiously. "I can usually solve a 'hard' math problem easily, but this one is _actually _hard..."

"Maybe playing my violin will help," she said, getting up and walking over to her desk, picking up her piano case and pulling out her beautiful emerald green violin that she'd had since she was 9, receiving it as a birthday present from her aunts Rose and Juleka. "That always makes me feel better."

"But what song should I do? Moonlight Densetsu?" She asked herself. "After all, I do know how to play the Sailor Moon theme on a violin as my freaky hidden talent."

And much to her luck, it certainly did. Music was something that ever since a young age, had always made Jade feel better about everything, and everyone had always told her that she'd inherited that from her father Luka.

"Now, back to solving that math problem..." Jade said as she walked back over to her bed, throwing herself down onto the mattress and letting it sink down for a minute, it eventually rising back up a few moments later.

"I got it!" she exclaimed, picking the book back up from its place on her nightstand and grabbing the book, flipping it back open to the page she was on. "The answer is 2.296552e+9!"

She quickly wrote down the answer on the sheet, smiling with relief as her head fell back against the pillow, her senses overwhelmed an exhausted from all of the studying she'd been doing today.

Pulling out her phone, Jade went to her video-call feature and checked her contacts, feeling the need to get out all of her excitement to her best friend Birdie.

Waiting for the screen to fully load so she could finally cut in a spare minute of talking with her best friend before drifting off to sleep, Jade was greeted with the familiar and friendly face of her gymnastics partner and BFF.

"Hey, Jay, what's the haps?" Birdie asked her, batting her turquoise eyes as she ran a couple fingers through her midnight-black hair.

"Oh, nothing much," Jade shrugged. "I just solved a new math problem."

"Nice!" Birdie grinned. "I just helped my moms with a new weather report practice, it's gonna air tomorrow!"

"That's awesome!" Jade congratulated. "Speaking of tomorrow, I can't wait for the first day of high school.

"Me neither," Birdie agreed. "But, something's telling me that this year is gonna be the farthest from ordinary it's ever been for us."

"Yeah," Jade agreed. "But, to be fair, I think that could be fun."

"Really?"

"Yeah!" Jade nodded. "After all, our lives haven't been the most normal before anyways, but more so mine. After all, it's not everyday your mom's a Olympic champion in fencing with your dad being a rockstar, and then you're _the _most intelligent kid in your school and are a star violinist, gymnast, and archer."

"True," Birdie said. "Good optimism, Jay."

"Why, thank you," Jade grinned, "After all, that's what everyone loves about me anyways."

"For sure," Birdie agreed. "I'm hoping that that'll be enough to get us both through the craziness of high school."

"Me too," Jade nodded in agreement. "But I have no doubt that we'll have any trouble getting it right."


	2. The Acrobat and the Ladybug

Maddie frantically made her way to school, running at a rapid speed from the sidewalk when she exited the bakery to the school's staircase, practically shoving things away & bolting like it was the end of the world, all to try and not be late. When she finally made it to the top of the staircase & into the school building, Lilli & Kara were standing there; looking like they'd been waiting for her for quite a while.

"Where were you, Mad?" Lilli energetically asked her.

"Yeah, we've been waiting for you for 30 minutes!" Kara told her, sounding a bit annoyed. "Unfortunately, so were the 4 Demons..." She joked, indicating the fact that Rebecca, Vivienne, Jade, & Brooke, or as Kara liked to call them, the 4 Demons, were standing several feet away from the trio of friends.

"I'm sorry, girls! I overslept because Emma reset my alarm clock & Lucian wanted me to play heroes with him, then I had to feed my dog & help my mom, and last, this old man, and when I say 'old', I mean _really _old, was about to fall & dropped his things, so I obviously I helped him before coming here!" Maddie quickly explained, sounding out of breath throughout her entire speech, then taking a huge & deep breath when not talking, with Kara slightly chuckling at her.

"Madgirl, it's totally fine! Trust me, you don't wanna possibly know how many times I've been late to my dentist appointments, I make _you_ look like nothing." Kara laughed, with Lilli joining her. Just as Maddie was about to joyously respond to her best friend's playful & harmless dig, Rebecca & her gang walked up to them & began their evildoing careers for high school.

"Ha, look! It's Maddie Always-Late Agreste. I see that you've taken after your mom's ways." Rebecca smirked.

Maddie couldn't care less about Becky being mean to her, in fact, she actually found it quite hilarious.

"And I see you're still walking like you have ice cubes poured in your jeans." She joked, with Lilli & Kara trying their best to not laugh her heads off at their other best friend's comeback, which was making fun of the way Becky walked. Rebecca acted like she didn't care about Maddie's somewhat shady response back to her; but on the inside, she wanted to curl up in a ball & die of embarrassment & fake cry like a baby.

Becky began to fake cry, with Vivienne & Jade trying to comfort her.

"Y'know, Madsie, you really shouldn't take about yourself that way," Brooke snobbishly remarked. "At the rate you do things, you'll be out of college by the time the world's gonna combust!" She finished, with all 4 mean girls laughing evilly.

"Classic trick for the 4 Demons, tsk, tsk tsk..." Kara began teasingly. "If I were you, I'd tape my mouth shut before someone pops me in it."

Rebecca & Brooke looked quite shocked at Kara's comeback in defense of her best friend, but still, they weren't giving up at trying to out-do them in roasting, but couldn't bring themselves to say anything. Rebecca silently walked away, the rest of the girls following behind her.

_'Well, they haven't changed a bit...' _Maddie thought. Maddie was no stranger to Rebecca & her gang's tricks: Ever since first grade, they'd always treated her badly for no reason at all. Sure, they could have reasoning as to why they were mean, and if they did, Maddie & company weren't exactly aware of them much. Could they change? Sure, but Maddie highly doubted it. Or so she thought...

* * *

It was now lunchtime, and Maddie still felt nervous; but it wasn't a reason that anyone knew about. That wasn't to say that nobody was growing suspicious; their teacher had asked her multiple times what was wrong, so did her friends & Emma when she'd walked over to the middle school since the outside lunch areas for both schools were right next to each other, before sitting down with Lilli & Kara. It was nearly time to go back to the classroom, and Maddie was still tapping her foot, resting her head on her hands, & being silent instead of her normal chatterbox self. Everyone at her table; her, Kara, Lilli, Emma, & Kailie were all silent, up until Kara had cracked and asked her what was wrong.

"Alright, Mads, what's wrong?" She asked in a frustrated voice. "You haven't been acting like yourself at all today, and we're all a bit worried." She told her, the others all nodding & saying words of concern for the dark-haired teen.

Maddie sighed before letting out the honest truth, still having a frightened feeling that heavily weighed on her chest.

"Alright," she gloomily moaned, rolling her green eyes. "When I was looking through my backpack earlier in class today, I found this strange box in one of the pockets. I know that I didn't have it when I left the house, but there's no sign of who gave it to me." She revealed, taking out a little brown box made of wood with red decals on it, setting it down on the table & showing it to her friends.

"Woah. That's dope!" Kara excitedly exclaimed.

"It's so pretty!" Lilli gasped.

"I guess it's cool." Kailie scoffed.

"I have one too!" Emma gasped, sounding quite shocked at the discovery that had just been made, her eyes widening. She took hers out & held it up on display for the others to see. She looked her older sister in the eyes, Maddie's green eyes analyzing Emma's green-&-blue ones. Both of them looked shocked, while Kara & Kailie along with Lilli patiently watched them.

Maddie didn't know what to feel in this moment. Whether it was good or bad, she knew that it 100% had to have something to do with her & her sister's fate.

"Should we open them together?" She asked, sounding nervous for what would happen next.

"Let's go for it." Emma said.

"But how can we trust that you'll _actually _do it and not chicken out?" Kara said. "When I count to three, you open them together. No excuses." She ordered them, both of the sisters nodding in agreement.

"One, two... three!" She exclaimed, Maddie & Emma both opening their boxes quickly & fearfully. Once they'd opened the small boxes, two energy balls or light circled the sisters, then coming back to be in front of them. Maddie's was first to reveal itself, being a flying red creature that looked like a ladybug, its shape reminding her of a tiny doll.

"Hello, I'm Tikki!" The little red creature said. Maddie didn't have a very chill reaction: She nearly fell backwards & off the bench when she screamed from fright, but Kara had luckily caught her from hitting her floor. Emma however, was quite chill about it & fist bumped hers, who from what he'd told her, was named Plagg.

"W-what are you?!" Maddie shrieked in fear, her teeth chattering & body shaking. She was hiding behind Kara, but was only able to see the mysterious creature since she was peeking over Kara's shoulder.

"My name's Tikki, and I'm your kwami." The little creature told the scared teenager. "What's your name?" She asked Maddie.

"Well, she's Madeline, but you can call her Maddie, and I'm her bestie Kara. She gets startled over anything & everything, so she's just shocked from seeing you." Kara told Tikki, both of them chuckling.

"Well, is she athletic? Up for adventure?" Tikki asked Kara.

"Um…. it depends," Kara hesitantly informed the kwami. "If she's feeling herself, definitely, if not, she turns into a statue inside a turtle's shell."

Tikki flew down to where Maddie hid under the rectangular lunch table, immediately finding the dark haired girl shaking like there was an earthquake.

"Maddie, don't be so afraid!" She reassured her. "If someone like your mother could be Ladybug, so can you." She joked.

"Wait, wait, wait." Maddie stuttered. "How do you know my mom? And what exactly do you mean by me, Madeline Sabine Agreste, a _superhero_?" She unbelievingly scoffed. "My sister's more than capable of doing it, but no, not me. I'm way too clumsy & forgetful to do it." She whined.

"Maddie, of course you can do it! You're capable of anything as long as you believe in yourself." Tikki told the nerve-wrecked Maddie, a smile on her face. "How about we go down to the gymnastics academy after school so you can test out your acrobatic tricks? I'm sure you can do it."

Maddie sighed at that. Sure, she'd love to accept Tikki's offer & do it, but she had a photoshoot to do for her mother's company right after school. Then, it struck her.

"I think I can make some arrangements, Tikki…" Maddie said in a plotting voice, her senses & emotions all tied together with the slick playing card she had up her sleeve. "But I think it might have to happen tomorrow." She smirked.

* * *

It was already the second day of school, and Maddie was sitting on the staircase all by herself, patiently waiting in silence to be picked up by her mother to go to yet another photoshoot. She sat there, confused & feeling lonely about her current fiasco, up until she felt a warm hand placed on her shoulder. Looking back to see whoever it may be that touched her, she was greeted by Kara's familiar face; wearing a curious & understanding look with a hint of excitement.

"Feelin' down?" Kara asked, taking a seat to Maddie's left and putting her arm around Maddie's shoulders. "I know how you feel, kid. Also, you'll never believe what happened today." As soon as she said that, Maddie immediately perked up and looked her best friend in the eyes.

"Well, what is it?!" Maddie asked intriguingly. "C'mon, you only make that voice & speak that way when it's something really good. Now, spill!" She joked.

Kara chuckled when hearing Maddie's response, then reaching into her backpack pocket to pull something out of it. "Look! I got one of the same boxes you & your sis got yesterday, and so did my sister when we opened our mailbox." When she said that, Maddie's eyes widened into small marble-shaped circles, both her green eyes looking they were about to pop out of her skull. "So by now, this definitely means something, and we're gonna figure it out stat." Kara announced, making two fists with her hands, positioning them in a karate chop-reminiscent pose.

"Well, I partially agree, but what about Lilli?" Maddie asked. "We can't leave her out, after all, she is a very good detective. Well, at least the people said so that one Halloween when she went as a female Sherlock two years ago." Maddie laughed out loudly.

"Already got it covered," Kara grinned. "She didn't get one, however, she did get a note from someone, found it in her locker after gym class, she even got a special someone else who got a box too to help us out with our tricks. Plus, Emma & Kai already told your parents that you can't make it to the photoshoot, they said you had to serve afterschool community service, and much to my surprise, they pulled it off!" Kara exclaimed.

"Really?!" Maddie said. "But I'm not really surprised, after all, they did get us that one April Fools Day when they tricked us into thinking that everyone dressed up in Christmas pajamas for the day." The navy-haired girl laughed, having a brief flashback to her memory of Emma & Kailie pranking Maddie and Kara into wearing their ugliest Christmas clothes the entire day back when she & Kara were 12 while Emma & Kailie were 10. It was definitely humiliating, but also definitely a moment that Maddie, Kara, & their sisters would cherish & laugh about forever.

"Hahah, yeah," Kara said. "But come on, they're waiting for us at the gymnastics place with Lilli as of right now, let's hurry!" She said, grabbing Maddie's arm & running down the street with her to the acrobatics center.

_'I can't wait for this to all be over...' _Maddie thought. Sure, she knew that an adventure was a risk worth taking, but she wasn't so sure that she wanted to take this one on. Little did she know that it would be the greatest journey she'd ever embark on...

When they'd finally reached the gymnasium, Maddie immediately walked into the restroom alone, staring at herself in the mirror with her hands clasped together fearfully. She took a few deep breaths in & out, repeating the process several times in order to try and get rid of her nerves.

After what had felt like an eternal period of silence, Maddie desperately sighed & gripped the outside of the sink with her hands, holding it like her life was depending on it. Facing down into the empty porcelain sink, she tightly closed her eyes, doing a quick recap of all the events that'd happened that had all led her up to this very moment; right here, right now. A short while later, Maddie finally looked back up again, her minty green eyes deeply staring into the bathroom mirror. Sighing yet again, the cobalt-haired teen reached her hand into her backpack, bending her right knee slightly to balance her heavy bag. She grabbed the wooden-like box with red decals again, holding it up to the side so the lid faced her, analyzing its complicated design. Inside Maddie's head, there was two voices with dividing points of view lurking inside her mind: One voice was telling her to quit & give up; strongly trying to convince her that she could never do this, that she shouldn't & couldn't do anything to save others. The other one however, was being her biggest cheerleader in this scenario. The voice that shouted words of encouragement, support, & belief released a wave of self-confidence & courage over her. Just as she was about give up & break down, listening to the voice full with negativity & discouragement, the supportive & reassuring voice screamed to her one last time, its volume completely overpowering the doubting emotions. At first, she was torn between what side to choose, not knowing if she should accept the offer & take on the challenge of being a superhero or chickening out and sitting on the sidelines to watch the others fight. She then remembered what Tikki said; clearly stating that she knew Maddie's mother when she was younger, also recalling her sister Emma constantly chatting about how Plagg had told her multiple tales about when he'd used to save the city with their father when on the phone with Kailie last night, informing her completely on the entire case. That was when it all hit her. Would her mother & father want her to quit? Would she be setting a good example for her brother & sister? Her friends? Everybody? Maddie depressingly sighed and let a few warm tears slide down her rosy cheeks, then wiping them off only a few short seconds later.

_'You can do this, Maddie. Just believe in yourself.'_

Taking one final deep breath, Maddie tilted the box back to its normal position & hesitantly opened it, only for Tikki to fly out directly in front of her face for the second time since Maddie had discovered the box.

"Maddie?" Tikki curiously asked. "Have you made your decision?" She patiently asked Maddie, a concerned look on the flying red creature's face.

"I have, Tikki," Maddie announced, a confident & fearless tone spreading through her voice. "I'll do it. Count me in." She bravely said, punching her open right palm with a clenched fist. Just before Tikki was about to ask Maddie an important question, probably the million-dollar question in the entire scenario, the door opened, a noise that was somewhat similar to when one would scratch their nails on a chalkboard, but just not as terrible. Maddie turned her head around to see Kara & Emma standing there, and from the minute they'd walked in, she could clearly see that Emma was excited about something good.

"Check out the ring, sis!" Emma cheered, fanning her face with her left hand to show off her new ring - also her source of power - to her older sister. "Don't ya love it?"

"Wow!" Maddie exclaimed, smiling happily. "It looks great on you."

"Thanks, glad you think so," Emma grinned. "I normally don't go for rings, but this one's a definite exception. Also, check this out! It's a picture of our parents along with Auntie Alya & Uncle Nino and Rebecca's mom, back when they were around our age, turns out they were the city's old heroes." She said, walking over to her older sister with her phone in her hand, handing it over to Maddie so she could get a good look at the old picture, from all the way back when their parents were Paris's original superheroes. When seeing it, Maddie finally smiled for the first time today. Sure, she'd smiled when talking to her friends, playing with her siblings, and modeling after school for her mother's company; but those were forced & unhappy smiles that she'd put on her face just to keep anyone - her parents & sister in particular - from growing suspicious on her strange behavior. After a couple seconds of smiling & giggling at the picture with her best friend and sister, a frown settled across her face. This time, her frown looked far more saddening & upset than her previous ones ever had, causing both Emma & Kara to be concerned for her.

"Hey, Mad, what's wrong?" Kara asked while walking towards her best friend, placing her hands on Maddie's shoulders from the back. "You know, I'm here to help you if you ever need it." She said, a comforting smile on her face while Emma nodded. Maddie sighed, then explained her entire fiasco.

"Fine," she puffed, rolling her green eyes. "You see, I know that the people of Paris will need me if anything bad was to happen, but I don't know if I can do it. But at the same time, I fear that I'll mess up and let everyone down if I don't do what my mom did to save everybody, & everyone'll hate me for it." She frowned, letting a few more smaller tears run down her normally rosy-shaded cheeks, but they'd faded into a blank & empty ivory, all from the despair & sadness running through her mind. After a moment of awkward silence, Emma & Kara both decided to say something to the sad cobalt-haired girl.

"Mads, you're not a failure, and you never will be," Emma said, tightly squeezing the upper half of Maddie's arm while the older sister hung her head down towards the ground. "It's okay to feel insecure, but you can't live that way forever, y'know. You can do this if you try & believe that you're capable, that's all it takes. But the real question is this: Do _you _believe in yourself?" Emma said, sounding concerned for her older sister. Maddie however, felt quite surprised by her younger sister's pep talk. All of this time, she'd always thought of Emma as some troublemaking and careless prankster, but in reality, she had a true heart of gold underneath her toughie-baddie façade. Maddie leaned forward to give her sister a hug, then thanking her for the support she'd received.

"Thanks, Em," Maddie smiled, wiping her remaining tears from her cheeks. "It means a lot to me. I'm so lucky to have you as my sister." She lovingly grinned. After a few seconds of letting her best friend be comforted by her little sister, Kara joined in on the hug, with approval from Maddie, of course. After a few short minutes that'd seemed to pass like seconds, their tight & warm hug was interrupted by Lilli peeking in through the opened door.

"Hey, Maddie. Emma," the youngest in the new high-school trio said. "I think I found someone who can help Mads with her agility & acrobatic tricks. She's right out here." Lilli smiled, a plotting grin coating her face.

"Um, what's that smile for?" Maddie cautiously asked, a frightened & forced expression on her face. "You only do that when you have some sort of scheme up your sleeve." She said, a knowing tone in her voice.

"Aw, c'mon, you've gotta trust me on this one, Mad!" Lilli wailed. "You'll definitely be thanking me afterwards." She grinned knowingly while heading away, closing the double-doors behind her.

"Hold the phone for now, Lills," Emma said, holding her palms up in order to calm down the scheming Lilli. "Maddie's still not sure on if she wants to do this or not." She alarmed the excited older girl, who looked a bit disappointed by Emma's announcement.

"So," Kara began. "Have you made your final decision yet, Maddie?" She asked. Maddie took a minute to process everything else going on, running it all through her brain nervously. Tapping her foot and anxiously clasping her hands together again & flexing them in & out, she looked down, then to her right, and finally, back to the front, facing Kara & Emma again, both of them looking concerned for Maddie with curiosity for what her answer would end up being.

"Yes. I have," She began, Kara and Emma's eyes widening in wonder of what her answer would turn out being. "I'm in. You've got me in this game, I won't leave or chicken out. I can do it." She answered. Emma nodded & gave her sister a fist bump & another hug, while Kara shot Maddie a thumbs up along with a proud smile. Once Emma had pulled away from their hug, Maddie walked over to where Kara stood against the wall.

"I'm proud of you, kid," Kara said, resting her hand on Maddie's shoulder, which had made the cobalt-hair smile. "Now come on, let's go work on your acrobatic skills, God knows you need it." Kara joked, but much to her & Emma's surprise, Maddie didn't get mad or elbow them in their chests this time. The three girls all smiled & held hands when exciting the restroom, together. As a team. That was what they were as normal people, and they would continue to do the same as superheroes.

* * *

Maddie walked across the leather-like gym mat cautiously, Kara covering her eyes with her hands while Emma & Kailie guided her.

"Alright, we're almost there," Kara said, sounding excited. "And... here we are!" She exclaimed, quickly removing her hands from Maddie's face while Emma & Kailie let go of her arms & back. Being the precautious person that she was, Maddie had kept her eyes closed even when Kara had her hands over them; but it wasn't exactly surprising due to the many superstitious habits that Maddie did usually. Once she'd opened her eyes, they'd widened in the way someone would act when seeing a surprise birthday party thrown for them, but instead of excitement & joy, Maddie's expression was one of shock & fright. Much to nobody's shock except for her, the "special guest" Lilli & Kara were referring to was no other than Jade. Sure, she was talented at gymnastics, no doubt about it; but it was also safe to say that she & Maddie didn't exactly get along the best. True, maybe things could change, but Maddie highly doubted the possibility of it happening. A million thoughts were swimming around inside her brain, yet all she could focus on was how to interact correctly with Jade. With her hands behind her back, Jade pulled her left hand out & held it towards Maddie, showing that she was going to give Maddie a formal greeting, whether they were friends or not. Being the polite & always kind person that she was, Maddie stuck her hand out & delicately shook Jade's, smiling. Usually, when being partnered up with Jade in the past or other matters, Maddie would always out on her best fake smile, which had always worked. However, this time, the smile that'd appeared across the navy's face was a pure & natural one; unlike the previous ones she'd shot to Jade. It'd made her think on two things: Whether she & the others had misjudged Jade, or if Jade had had a change of heart & Maddie and her friends were correct at first, because from what Maddie could remember right off the bat, Jade normally never would've done that in the past. Maybe something had gone down that Maddie wasn't aware of, but all she could do right now was get on with her training & focus on what was important.

"Hello, Madeline." Jade said in a warm & friendly voice. "It's nice to see you here." The navy-blackish-haired girl shyly smiled. Maddie grinned back to Jade; still feeling a little aftershock from Jade's different behavior. The other shocking action that Jade had executed was her calling Maddie by her lengthened name; a habit that she'd never done when with Rebecca & the others. But Maddie didn't exactly mind it; being called Madeline by others made her feel like a more mature girl; her feeling like the people who referred to her as it took her like she was a serious adult.

"Um, hi, Jade." She squeaked out. With saying that, Maddie began to internally facepalm herself for the small but goodhearted sentence. Sure, what she said _had _been rather nice to a girl she didn't exactly get along with, but it was nothing compared to the greeting that Jade had gifted her with.

"Come on, now," Jade demanded, managing to make it sound polite & delicate. "Let's get started." She grabbed Maddie's hand & cautiously guided the taller girl over to the balance beam, Maddie's eyes opening wide in fear. Since she'd built up some muscles from being a ballerina & running twice a week with her dad, Maddie already knew a way that she could push herself up onto the large wooden leather-covered bar. After she'd gotten up & onto the thin wood-made platform, sitting with her legs crossed, Maddie stared down at the ground. Wondering a billion different things, Maddie reached a speculation that could have made her heart skip a beat. What if she was wrong about Jade all along & wasn't cut out to be a hero? After all, being a person that assumed the worst about others & judged based on only a few experiences with said person wasn't exactly the right fit, as least personality-wise that was, to be a superhero; a person who did good things for everyone, selfless & unconditionally caring, a superhero on the inside _and_ the outside. If her assumption about Jade was wrong, Maddie didn't have any of those qualities inside of her. Feeling a large lump begin constricting inside her throat & her eyes welling up with warm, stinging tears, Maddie's depressed thoughts were suddenly interrupted by an alarm from Jade herself.

"Alright, Maddie, get up," Jade ordered. "I want you to try a cartwheel, if you can do one of those, you can do the other moves I want you to." She instructed Maddie in a mature & rather professional tone, which had given the nerve-wrecked girl a small dose of reassurance & self-confidence. Maddie stood up, placing her feet on the thin bar in a delicately-executed manner. Now standing with her right foot towards the far back of the bar & her left one forward, balancing itself on her toes, Maddie spread her arms out so they'd look like a "T" shape. Even though she knew that she could do a cartwheel yet with all her experience in ballet, she still felt nervous.

"I-I'm scared," Maddie stuttered, turning her head to the right so she could look at Jade & the others. "I don't think I can do it."

"Don't be!" Jade shouted, trying her best to give Maddie a boost of confidence & encouragement.

"Just chill out, Mads, you've got this!" Kara grinned.

"They're right, Mad," Emma smiled. "You can do this. I believe in you." With that sentence, all discourage & fright faded from Maddie's senses. Her body's muscles no longer felt tightened & tense; they were completely free from their former constriction. Moving her arms up from their former "T" shape into the air, a "Y" like shape now resembling her arms' position. She bent down, gripping the beam with her hands like her life was depending on it, kicking her legs into the air & kicking them clockwise, her eyes closed while her body's individual strengths all combined themselves to give her the true strength she needed to land this cartwheel. After a few seconds of her eyes closed & her state of mind being somewhere in the sense where she was walking on air, Maddie felt her feet touch something thin, hard, & slippery again. She had landed it! Standing straight back up again with a proud smile on her face, she heard Kara, Emma, Lilli, & Jade all clapping & cheering for her. Minorly turning so she was now standing sideways on the beam & facing her friends, Maddie's small grin had turned into an ear-to-ear smile, growing every bit larger by the second from the joy & self-confidence she'd felt wash over her body from the other girls' cheers & applauses. She then bowed down confidently, grasping her knees in order to regain her balance and catch her breath, slightly tilting her head up to shoot Jade a happy & thanking smile. Jade smiled back, bobbing her head down. Grasping the beam's somehow slippery pleather, Maddie allowed herself to sit down onto the thin width of the balance beam, then plopping back onto her feet & running to hug all of the other girls. Kailie, who sat over on a small bench, was signaled by Kara & Emma to come over and join them in the hug, her smiling too. After a minute of cheering & squeezing each other tightly in the hug, the girls released in a halting silence, Maddie breaking it only five seconds later, at the least.

"Hey, girls, would you all mind leaving for a second?" She politely asked. "I need to talk to Jade alone." When those words slipped out of Maddie's mouth, she'd expected the other girls to snap at her & deny her kindly-asked favor, but they all nodded & left Jade & Maddie in the gym, alone together.

"So, why'd you ask them to leave?" Jade asked Maddie, sounding quite worried & concerned. "Is something going on?"

"Well... kind of." Maddie muttered while Jade lead her over to the vault. "You see, I felt shocked when the mystery person Lilli had gotten to help me with my acrobatic tricks was you, only because we haven't exactly had the best past with one another. You see, when you, Rebecca, & the others used to tease me when we were younger, I'd always thought of you guys as the worst people on Earth and didn't want anything to do with you guys at all. So when you were going to help me, I'd felt a bit surprised, at first, but not in the good way, I was kind of disgusted. But after all the way you helped me & showed me support, the opinion I had about you completely changed. Jade, you're a much better person than anyone thinks, and if you show it to not just me & show everyone else who you are inside, I'm sure they'll like you." Maddie slowly said, explaining each part of her thoughts thoroughly & calmly. She'd expected for Jade to get angry & slap her into outer space, but much to her surprise, Jade smiled, put one hand on Maddie's shoulder & the other on her bicep, & then told the green-eyed some rather... exciting news with a joyous chuckle.

"Oh, Maddie!" Jade exclaimed. "It's totally okay to feel that way. In fact, I felt really lost at first when I began going to school, but when I met Brooke, since she was the first person I met, along with Vivienne & Rebecca, I thought that we'd be friends forever. Well, that was up until the aftermath of today's events..." She sighed, looking to the side. Once that sentence filled the blank, halting quietness of the room, Maddie almost immediately asked Jade what she'd meant by her most recent sentence.

"Huh?" Maddie said, tilting her head to the side. "What do you mean by that?"

"Well..." Jade sadly began. "I was hanging out with Vivienne & Rebecca in the theatre, and we were heading back to our classroom, and that was when it happened. We saw Brooke talking to another friend of hers, & she was talking about how good she'd brainwashed us & that "her plan would carry out soon", and we all were equally shocked by what she'd said, so Rebecca questioned her, then she started throwing things & screaming at Brooke, and man, was she angry. So then, a teacher that was randomly walking through the hallway saw their spar happening, so he pulled them away & took us to her principal's office, and then everything was explained. Brooke & Rebecca are both suspended, & their moms are definitely disappointed in them for it. Thankfully, Vivienne & I didn't get in any trouble, which is a relief. Then, she, Rebecca & I all discovered our mysterious boxes, the same one you got. Here's mine," Jade told her in despair, then pulling out her small wooden box, showing it to Maddie, who's eyes widened in wonder.

"Wow..." The older girl said, sounding a bit entranced from her shock.

"Yeah," Jade nodded. "Look at it. It's some sort of brooch or something, isn't it beautiful?" She said. "It obviously is supposed to resemble a peacock, but of course, there's no color because my little kwami or whatever it's called came out. Speaking of which... You wanna see mine? Her name's Duusu & she's super cool, you'll love her. Speaking of which, what's yours named? Lilli told me all the details on your encounter yesterday over the phone last night." Jade smiled.

"Really?" Maddie began, sounding shocked. "First of all, I am so gonna destroy your little once she comes back in here. Second, you did get it right, that _is _what they're called. Lastly, mine's named Tikki, and guess what? She's the same one my mother used to have, which means all the more stress that people will put on be to be like her, so I don't know if I want to do it or not." Maddie said, frowning. At first, she had played a simple joke to make them both laugh, then a kind affirmation, and finally, an angered & sad sigh, looking down to the royal blue flooring from where she sat on the vault. Jade stood directly in front of Maddie, then letting her hand rest on Maddie's knee.

"Maddie, don't worry about being compared to your mother! You guys are both great in your own ways, and there's no need to constantly be comparing yourself to her." Jade smiled, reassuring her fairly new friend with a comforting voice. "Also, you can totally do this. You have me, Lilli, Kara & Kailie, your family, everyone who cares about you is going to be right there to support you throughout this journey." The older girl affirmed without a second's hesitation.

"Thanks, Jade," Maddie shyly smiled while pulling Jade in tightly for a hug & picking her up onto the vault. "It really means a lot. Also, if you've been redeemed already, what about Vivienne & Becky? After all, anything's possible." She laughed.

"Oh yeah, I forgot them," Jade chuckled, moving her silky black hair out of her face. "So far, they're slowly & surely turning nice, if they keep it up, they could become actually liked by the other kids. Bu-" Jade began again, speaking a little short response before pausing to catch her breath in order to start one more time, getting cut off by hearing a loud crash that'd caused both her & Maddie to jump off of the vault, their hearts jumping up from the startling & unexpected noise. Turning around, they saw a thin & tall figure with a regal purple-like skin tone, wearing a silver & sky blue unitard with a sparkling golden "A" around the section of their torso. When seeing the mysterious figure, Jade made karate chop hands while Maddie stood up, making two fists with one of her hips popped to the side.

"Who are you?" Maddie yelled to the mystery villain.

"I am no other than the Acrobat, and I'm here to cause others to have a total flip-out." The villain, who's name was revealed to be the Acrobat said in a malicious, feminine-sounding voice.

"Alright, I'm a gymnast too, and I will admit that that was a terrible pun." Jade said in a serious voice range.

"So?" The Acrobat shrugged. "I will conquer the city of Paris, and nobody will ever stop me!" Acrobat shouted again, sending a wave of wind that had knocked Maddie & Jade completely off of their feet. Since they were the only two in the room, not including the Acrobat, there was no one else to protect the two girls. The acrobat slowly but scarily moved towards the lying down & somehow still bodies of Maddie & Jade; getting closer & closer to the duo, second by second. Maddie & Jade bent up their arms, unsteadily trying to shield themselves from the sinister Acrobat. Just as she was about to finish off Jade & Maddie for good and end the short-lived war, a red blur of color floated in front of them.

"Stop!" That was the first formation of color speaking, and Maddie almost instantly recognized the voice.

"Tikki?" She said in shock. "What are you doing?"

"Protecting you," The ladybug-reminiscent kwami told her owner. "You have the strength & selflessness within you, Maddie. Giving Jade a chance & becoming her friend perfectly shows that you have those qualities. Are you going to do it?" Tikki told the insecure Maddie, who looked up to the Acrobat, then briefly sharing a glance with Jade, who gave Maddie a believing nod. Reaching for the ruby-red duffel bag she'd brought to the studio, Maddie dug into one of its pockets & took out the box, quick to put on the silver stud earrings.

"I'll do it, Tikki!" Maddie confidently affirmed her kwami, a courageous smile on her face. "But one thing: _How _do I transform?"

"You just say one thing;" Tikki told Maddie in excitement from the teen's decision. "Tikki, spots on!"

"Got it!" Maddie cheered. "Tikki, spots on!" With those three words, Maddie then suddenly appeared in a red outfit with black dots, now the world's newest superhero: Ladybug. Looking down & admiring her new superhero uniform, Maddie happily gasped in surprise.

"Wow! I look amazing!" Maddie cheered. "Jade, come on, do it with me!" Once she'd turned around, Jade was already up, trying to fight off the Acrobat with all her might.

"Jade!" Maddie yelled at her new friend from afar, Jade darting her head to look at Maddie, and when she wasn't looking, the Acrobat had made a quick run for it.

"What?" The older girl yelled back, sounding out of breath & exhausted.

"Get your kwami & ask her how to get your superpowers, then we can defeat the Acrobat for good!" Maddie instructed her, sounding 100% confident & sure in her answer. Once Jade had heard Maddie's order, she ran over to her bag, pulled out her peacock wing-like piece of jewelry, & clipped the button onto her shirt & yelled out what Duusu & had told her the transformation words were.

"Duusu, feathers on!" Jade shouted out, her heroine uniform appearing to be a knee-length dress with strips of fabric representing a peafowl's feathers, the upper half of the dress being the same, with two peacock feather fans clutched tight in Jade's hands.

"Woah, I look awesome!" Jade said with an excited nature. "Maddie, hold on! I'm coming!" She yelled, running over to where Maddie - well, Ladybug in this case - was, dashing from the Acrobat, who was currently trying to attack her. But thankfully, she was surprisingly very flexible & dodged every one of her attacks, much to her dismay. Leaping in front of Maddie in order to try to shield her from the Acrobat's newest attack, she fluttered her fans & used her hands' strength to push back against Acrobat's mighty fists.

"Suck on this, flip-dee-dork!" Jade snapped, pushing hard & strongly to the Acrobat & her moves, knocking the flexy villain to the ground. At first, Jade had thought that she'd tired out Acrobat, but that wasn't the case at all. The Acrobat had bent herself backwards & landed straight on her feet, then sending a gust of wind out, knocking both Jade and Maddie into a bench & onto their backs, tumbling off the bench backwards. The girls slowly crouched up, using their arms to support their weakened bodies' weight, gazing up at the Acrobat in horror. In just a few seconds, she'd finish them both off for good. It would all be over. Or so they thought. The Acrobat raised her arms up in the air high, holding up a baton she'd found in the rhythmic gymnastics room, using a source of her power to largen it into a huge pole to knock out Jade & Maddie. Just as he Acrobat was about to destroy the girls once & for all, her sinisterly cackling while they trembled in fear, a silver pole knocked Acrobat across the room & was held close to her stomach, its strike being followed by a familiar voice.

"Nice try, Acrobrat, but we've got you cornered." It was no other than Emma, who'd transformed into her hero uniform; looking like a black cat, just like her & Maddie's father was all those years ago, but a dark-haired gender swap version with blue-green eyes. Maddie looked quite happy about her sister's heroic save, then turning her head to see the other girls standing there along with Vivienne & Rebecca, all transformed. They were all different animals: Kara was a fox, Kailie was a turtle, Rebecca was a bumblebee, & Vivienne was a butterfly. Maddie was first to begin speaking after Emma, then double-checking with the other girls to see if she really wasn't seeing things. Kara walked forward to help Maddie up, using a gentle yet strong pull to get her best friend off of the ground.

"Here, let me help you." The taller brunette answered.

"Thanks, Kara," Maddie said, dusting herself off. "And Kailie, is that you? And Vivienne & Rebecca too?" She asked with wonder.

"We're not them right now," Kara coyly grinned. We are..."

"Scarlett Fox!" She whooped.

"Shellie!" That was Kailie talking.

"Queen Bee!" Rebecca spoke that time.

"Wingwoman!" The fourth name announcement came from Vivienne, who was dressed in purple & silver.

"And Kitty Noir." The fifth & final sentence came from Emma, who was dodging the Acrobat's attacks as the others spoke to each other. The other didn't look at her when she spoke, but they certainly looked when they heard a loud "bang!" come from where she stood. Around Emma, a large & thick cloud of smoke appeared, surrounding her entire body as well nearly the entire gym floor. The other girls slowly made their way through the large puff of smoke, using theirn hands to shoo the white fog away while coughing. Eventually, Maddie had found Emma & pulled her forward, all the girls including Lilli, who had just ran in the cold & foggy room, now standing together.

"Aw, man, the Acrobrat got away!" Kailie huffed, swinging her arm to the side.

"Don't worry, I know _just _how to find her," Emma plottingly grinned. "I put a tracking device on her back, so we should know just where to find her." The younger Agreste sister said in a scheming tone.

"Great, Ems," Maddie sighed in relief. She came to a pause of silence for a moment, but began speaking just as the others were beginning to walk away. "But guys, we should probably wait at least 15 minutes to see where the Acrobat ends up being, wherever they stay for at least over 3 minutes is where we should begin scoping out." The new Ladybug ordered her teammates, then turning around to go think up a new plan. They all nodded to her & gave words of agreement, all but one of them, that was.

"Are you serious?!" Rebecca snapped angrily. "We should just go & follow Acrobatcrazy, or whatever its stupid name is. Way to be a leader, Agreste."

"Um, _excuse me_?" Maddie said, turning back around with her hand on her hip while making a fist with the opposite hand, then snapping her fingers at Rebecca. "You're the one who beat up your ex-bestfriend in the hallway & got suspended, aren't you, Rebecca Maeve Kim?" Maddie snapped, now having both of her hands on her hips while popping out her left foot & leg.

"You wanna go? And who told you that?" Rebecca snapped, flicking her honey mustard-color hair behind her while Jade slouched upon hearing Rebecca ask who told Maddie about her violent encounter with Brooke. "Plus, says the daughter of a wannabe fashion designer who destroyed my mother's dreams!"

"And that's being said by the daughter of the second meanest person to ever be 15 in Paris?" Maddie angrily said, gritting her teeth together. Just as the two girls were about to go at it yet again, Kara raised her hand to ask Maddie a question.

"Um, excuse me?" The dark brunette asked. "Who's the meanest ever?"

Maddie was quick to respond to her best friend's query, dividing the winner's name into 3 parts.

"Rebecca. Maeve. Kim." Once the midnight-haired had said that, Rebecca's face was redder than a ruby. Her shoulders were shrugged up tightly & her fists were greatly tightened, her stomping over to Maddie in anger.

"You better shut up, Madeline Sabine Agreste!" Rebecca shouted angrily, throwing a small yoga block away from where she'd been standing. "You're the world's clumsiest & stupidest dork ever, everyone knows it!" She shouted. But much to the others' shock, Maddie didn't cry, stutter, or run away; she only got more courageous.

"Y'know what, Rebecca? I learned something very important today." Maddie began, sternly speaking in a confident voice. "I learned that no matter the person or situation, people can always change, even when you least expect it. Jade is the one who taught me that, turns out, she only pretended to dislike me just so she could be your _friend_."

Rebecca was shocked by hearing that, in complete disbelief that one of the only people close to her that she'd ever known in her short life would do such a thing for her. Jade was _that _selfless, to the point where she was willing to let the sweetest girl in school, the daughter of her idols in fact, the friendliest, nicest, & most chill person ever be her friend, all because she wanted to keep one she already knew who strongly disapproved of the girl she longed to establish a bond with? Rebecca's eyes began to well up with tears, her eyes now feeling heavy on her eyelids. She covered her face with her hands & ran out of the double doors crying, Maddie looking at her with shock, realization, sadness, & disappointment. Standing with her right foot in front of the left & her right arm spread out, like she was trying to pull Rebecca back from running away on her shoulders, it felt like time along with Maddie's entire body had froze, and like she & the doors slowly slamming back into their closed form were the only two remaining things on earth. After what had felt like an eternity of silence & stillness, the saddened raven-hair moved her arm back and let it fall down to her waist, stood with her feet directly next to one another, and hung her head down, letting out a depressed & sad sigh before walking away & pushing the doors open herself, walking right back to where her family's mansion was located. The other girls looked at her walk out, their eyes all glued straight to their sad friend. Kara was first to break the silence, asking her sad best friend a simple question.

"Mads, where are you going?"

"Home," the older girl sighed in sadness. "Tikki, spots off." She untransformed without hesitating, completely giving up on the goal of stopping the Acrobat. She then took off the now silver earrings, reaching for her duffel bag to get out the box where she'd first found the petite studs & putting them back in, Tikki's small body being instantly sucked back into the earrings.

"I'm gonna go find Acrobat, and Vivienne & Kailie, I'm gonna need you guys." Emma ordered while going out the other door, one that'd lead to the hallway & elevators, Kailie & Vivienne following behind her. Kara shook her head and sighed, feeling a strong wave of second-hand guilt wash over her. She was the one who'd originally convinced Maddie to go to the gym & practice to become Ladybug; so all of this wouldn't probably have happened if Kara had never encouraged her to do it. Lilli watched Maddie leave, sighing & tilting her head to the right, however, she didn't feel nearly as bad as Kara did.

Maddie was deep into her sad & depressing thoughts, only thinking how she'd let everyone down & ruined everything. The clock read that it was only 5:45, but Maddie's level of sadness was already clocked around fully.

_'I'm sorry to have let you all down...'_

All of her worries about being just as good of a Ladybug as her mother had long faded, because in the matter of truth, she could & would never compare to Marinette Dupain-Cheng's history of being Ladybug. Because unlike Maddie, Marinette was excellent at being it all. A friend, a superhero, a student, and most of all, as a person.

* * *

It was now 7:00, and Maddie laid on her back, sinking deep into her soft & warm bed. She stared up at the ceiling, the walls of which were painted in her favorite color; peony pink, just like the rest of the walls of her room. The others were still searching the city for Acrobat, but there wasn't much time left to succeed in doing that, considering that the sun was just beginning to set. Maddie looked out of her bedroom window from the couch, wondering if this was the same way that her dad felt sometimes, knowing that he was a superhero just like her when he was her age and he used to live inside this very room. Sighing and reaching up to check out her phone, Maddie was stopped by hearing two hard and loud knocks on the door.

"Come in." She muttered, sadly sighing.

"Knock, knock!" Marinette peppily said to her daughter, wrapping her arm around Maddie's shoulders.

"Oh. Hey, Mom. Dad," Maddie sighed in a melancholy, wooden voice. "As you can obviously tell, I feel quite sad right now over the events of earlier."

"Don't be sad, kitten," Adrien said, fluffing his oldest child's dark locks & giving her a kiss on the temple & rubbing her back. "It wasn't your fault, that's just Rebecca being... Rebecca. Believe me, your mom and I would know based on our experiences with her mom."

"More so me," Marinette chuckled. "But thankfully, Chloe's matured quite a lot now & we get along fine. We're not friends, but not enemies. Hopefully, Rebecca will turn a corner one day & mature so you two could build a friendship." She told her older daughter, staring into Maddie's beautiful mint-green eyes.

"Yeah," Maddie nodded, still sounding a little bit sad. "Thanks, Mom and Dad. It means a lot to me have you guys as my parents." She smiled finally, yet another genuine one, the first time today she'd done so, aside when hanging with Jade. Her response made her parents melting puddles of parental hormones, which made Maddie get a good chuckle out of them. But she then realized something that'd seemed a bit off, so she asked her parents her question, getting the answer that she shouldn't have found _that _unexpected at first, but she did find it only a bit shocking at first.

"But hey, how'd you know I was sad because of what happened with Rebecca and the others?"

"Well, your sister called us & told us everything, well that, and she was worried about you & how you were doing and you got your earrings, she got the ring, and you two along with the others became the new generation of heroes," Adrien laughed. "Plus, Auntie Alya called your mother & was all worried about how Kara feels guilty about making you try out your gymnastics moves and how it all led up to the entire fiasco." After Adrien had said that, all of the happiness & joy Maddie had felt for the first time on forever had disappeared, like _that_. A hurricane of fear began to wash over her & her emotions, making her feel all holed up & afraid inside again for what had felt like the trillionth time. Her eyes that were once all green & lively, filled with excitement & cheer had faded into colorless, lifeless marble-like eyes that one would normally see in a cartoon character's eyes that were looking towards the location where she'd hid the box, which was inside the drawer of her nightstand, while her face's light & ivory-beige color had turned into one of a Russian nesting doll's skin tone shade. She heavily sighed for the 100th time or so, then falling back against her queen-size bed & moaning in despair and irritation. Her parents then got up from the edge of her bed and moved to the side of her horizontally angled bed, staring at her as she covered her face with her pillow.

"What's wrong?" They asked in perfect unison, which was something similar to a friendship habit that she & Kara would do at times.

"I-It's everything!" She shouted out in misery, her eyes beginning to well up with strong, heavy, warm tears. "I messed up big time, I let everyone down, you guys, Lucian & Emma, Kara & Lilli, & Auntie Alya & Uncle Nino!" She said. It was only until her vision & the room's image began to blur when she realized that she had been crying her eyes out. "And... and I didn't mean to put the whole city in danger by messing up..." She choked out, trying to fight back her still developing tears that were about to begin to drip from her eyes. "I wanted to be there for everyone when they needed it, and I couldn't even help my own sister. I let down my family, my friends, I let down everyone in Paris with my poor actions. I ruined everything." The raven-haired girl buried her face deep in her hands, letting her scorching & humongous tears flood her hands. She felt a hand place itself on her right shoulder, pulling her in for a tight & comforting hug. Once she was completely pulled into the hug, she sniffled & was greeted with a strong whiff of a flowery perfume, so it was quite obvious that her mother was the one giving her a hug. Before she could say anything, Marinette comforted her daughter with a good example that'd knocked Maddie back into her space of happiness.

"You didn't ruin anything at all, Maddie," Marinette softly whispered. "You were just overwhelmed with all of the stresses that come with discovering you're destined to save your home. You can still fix this, there's 24 hours in the day with a little under 5 left, so you've got more than enough time to solve this mistake." She whispered into her daughter's ear, making her words just loud enough in able for Adrien to be able to hear the conversation between his wife & older daughter.

"She's right, kitten," Adrien commented, his nickname for Maddie making her smile. "And wipe those tears away." He said again, moving towards his eldest, wiping the tears from her cheeks while locking sight with her green eyes; the very ones she'd inherited from him. "And you're far too beautiful to be crying, anyways." That short yet sweet comment brought happy tears to Maddie's eyes, an ear-to-ear smile that was bursting with genuine love & happiness spread across her face. She then leaned away from the hug she'd been in with her mother, leaning forward to hug her father, him gladly returning the snug embrace to his daughter. Resting her head on his shoulder, she tearfully smiled & wiped her happy tears on the sleeve of his shirt, but he didn't seem to care or notice.

"Thank you so much, Daddy," she happily spoke through her happy sobs, squeezing him even tighter. "I love you."

"I love you, too," Adrien spoke with a loving smile. They then both pulled away from the hug, looking at one another in their green eyes, the gaze ending with Adrien tilting his head down to press a kiss to Maddie's forehead. A small & swift silence remained in the room, up until Marinette told Maddie something that she'd seemed to forget all about when her father had comforted her.

"Well, miss Ladybug, aren't you gonna go find your friends & save the day?" Marinette asked her, sounding quite amused for an unknown reason. "They're gonna need you after all, but most importantly, I think that you'll be needing this." She said, handing Maddie the small box that contained the mysterious earrings, which she'd found while rummaging through Maddie's nightstand drawer when she'd been hugging Adrien, using their touching father-daughter moment to grab the box. Maddie instantly grabbed the box from her mother, opening the box to put on the earrings, it all going by in a flash. Tikki then appeared, but Maddie didn't even give her any time to explain what had gotten into her & the cause she was now stepping up to the challenge.

"Tikki, spots on!" Within seconds, Maddie was transformed into the Ladybug uniform once again, her parents watching with pride & amazement.

"I can believe my little girl is becoming the newest Ladybug," Marinette said, happy tears slightly going down her cheeks. "Now, go save some Parisians & kick some Acrobat butt." She smiled, Maddie smiling back.

"Now got make us proud, Kitten." Adrien grinned, putting his hand on Maddie's left shoulder, while Marinette placed hers on Maddie's right shoulder.

"You got it!" She cheerfully smiled, shooting her parents a thumbs up with her other arm crossed across her chest. She opened the window & climbed onto the windowsill, looking back to her parents one last time to give them one final smile, topped off with a sweet nod. Aiming her yoyo for a nearby object to attach the red children's toy that was in reality a hero weapon with black dots, which made it resemble a ladybug, she pushed her feet off of the windowsill & swung through the air at a great speed, moving into her next adventure, the greatest one that'd ever happen to her.

* * *

It was already 8:45, and Kitty Noir, Scarlett Fox, Shellie, Wingwoman, Queen Bee, and Tropica aka Jade still hadn't found & caught the Acrobat, and they were all standing on top of a bridge, eating ice cream from Andre's, in which Vivienne had insisted that they should get something from there.

"So, what do we do now?" Scarlett Fox asked Kitty Noir.

"I don't know," Kitty sighed. "We're six parts of a team of 7, but we don't have our Ladybug here with us. Without her, we're pretty much done for."

"I don't think you're done for yet." An extremely familiar voice said from behind them. The girls all darted around almost immediately, all excitedly cheering out the name of the figure dressed in black & red.

"Ladybug!"

"We missed you!" Kitty Noir thankfully exclaimed, hugging her older sister tight.

"Missed you too," Maddie said, patting Emma/Kitty Noir's back. "But we need to find the Acrobat. She's dangerous & we've gotta find if so she can't put anyone in danger, and if she already has, we can't let it happen again." Maddie ordered in a confident voice, her eyes scanning over her teammates. All but one.

"Queen Bee?" Ladybug asked. "I need to talk to you. It's important." Then, Queen Bee cowardly stepped forward, inching slowly & surely to where Ladybug stood, only under 8 feet away. Ladybug then grabbed Queen Bee's hand, slowly guiding her over to a more discreet place for the two insect-themed heroes to have their conversation.

"Look, I wanted to say sorry about what happened earlier." Maddie began apologetically. "I shouldn't have resented you for being my former enemy, and from what I've heard, Brooke was a huge impact on your attitude towards me."

"Don't even say her name," Rebecca quietly choked out, fighting back tears. "She was one of my best friends, & knowing that everything she told me about you & your sister, the Lahiffe sisters, & Lilli, was fake, I feel horrible for treating you guys the way I did based on what my fake friend told me." She admitted, giving Maddie a sincere yet tearful apology.

"It's okay, but you're not completely wrong." Maddie bravely admitted. "I should never have said what I said about you, I was way out of line. I hope you can forgive me, & maybe, just maybe, we could build the foundation of a _true_ friendship." She said, sticking her hand out in order to try & shake Rebecca's.

"Okay," the honey-brown haired girl whimpered. And that was when it happened. Maddie pulled Rebecca in, cradling the blue-eyed girl in her arms, not letting go or loosening her grip. The hug lasted for a long time, it being probably around 25 minutes later when the two girls released.

"Okay, now," Maddie said. "Let's go, Queen Bee."

"Let's, Ladybug." Rebecca jokingly said back with a smile, grabbing Maddie's hand & twirling her around, then clutching the raven's hand tight as they walked back to where the others stood waiting for them.

"You all ready?" Scarlett Fox asked. Queen Bee & Ladybug turned their heads, looking at each other one last time, right before nodding & answering to Kara in synch.

"We're ready."

"Great!" Kitty Noir cheered, pumping her arms into the air. "But wait, what's our plan?"

"I think I have one that'll work," Ladybug grinned, rubbing her chin with her fingers. "But I'm gonna need everyone's help this time. Are you all in?" They all nodded with curiosity on the plan, looking to their leader with respect & loyalty to her.

"Alright, but there's two parts. Scarlett Fox, I'm gonna need you to create an illusion of us standing there, giving up in order to trick Acrobat. Shellie, you're gonna need to use your shield & team up with your girl Kitty. And Kitty, you're gonna have to use your baton for this challenge." Ladybug ordered, then walking over to her sister Kitty & whispering the plan in her ear. Ladybug then walked back to her original position, explaining the second part of her masterplan.

"Wingwoman, you're going to have to power up our girls Scarlett & Kitty for this, you'll see why though. Queen Bee, I need to have you sticking with me, and we'll use our individual moves together. And Tropica, you're gonna finish off the plan by using one of the fans from your feathers to control Acrobat once we lure her in." Maddie announced, a smug & satisfied grin on her ivory face while the rest of the hero team nodded with agreeing smiles.

"Alright now, everybody ready?" Ladybug asked, using a pumped-up voice.

"Ready!" The other heroes answered, confident grins on each one of their faces.

"Then let's go!" Maddie cheered, raising her arm into the air.

* * *

Kitty Noir & Scarlett Fox stood together back-to-back, both holding their weapons in order to have the immediate ability to attack the Acrobat when & if she struck soon.

"You ready, Kit?" Scarlett asked.

"Never have been more, Scar," Kitty replied. A short second afterwards, Kitty Noir's ears perked up with a strong sense of a near presence of the Acrobat. Kitty loudly gasped before alerting Scarlett Fox about their verdict's close appearance.

"Scarlett Fox, the Acrobat's near!" Kitty whispered, panicking. "You're gonna need to get your illusion up soon."

"You've got it," Scarlett smiled, giving Kitty Noir a quick thumbs up. Playing a short melody on her flute, Scarlett Fox went into a deep focus mode in the illusion she'd been instructed to create by Ladybug, it being a huge success.

"Mirage!" Scarlett Fox aimed her flute for the left side of the bridge, then quickly sliding down Kitty Noir's extended baton, which she'd used in order for Scarlett to slide down onto the boat she waited in so they could hide away from the Acrobat. The two girls quietly leaned backwards to try & see if their trick would work on Acrobat. The illusions of the superheroes began to speak to Acrobat, who was completely oblivious to the trick that was being pulled on her.

The first illusion of the seven heroines to begin speaking was the illusion of Ladybug, who admitted that she was going to give in & let the Acrobat win.

"You win, Acrobat," the illusive version of Ladybug spoke.

"Yeah, you overpowered us by far." The second voice spoke, this one being the illusion of Kitty Noir.

"We never could've defeated you, you're just too strong," Number three was the duplicate of Scarlett Fox, who's words didn't earn such a positive reaction from the real Scarlett.

"Hey! I'd never say that to any villain." Kara hissed, making a tight, clenched fist.

"Chill, and be quiet!" Emma scolded. "We can't let Acrobat find out that those ones up there are fakes."

"Alright," Kara moaned, rolling her eyes. After their minor talk was over, the fourth illusion-made figure - the one of Kailie aka Shellie, to be clear - added to the speech their duplicates were reciting.

"Scarlett's right, I guess we're just wannabes." Duplicate Shellie added.

"No hero like us could take you down." That was the double of Queen Bee speaking, a halting tone heavily ringing throughout the notes of her voice.

"Bee's right, I guess we're just useless, powerless failures." The sixth out of the seven doubles spoke, this one being Vivienne's duplicate.

The final duplicate then spoke, being the one of Jade, who was the only one in the group that had yet to speak.

"Here are our jewels, you need them a lot anyways." The illusion-made Tropica said, takinf off her peacock hair clip, same with the other girls. Duplicate Ladybug removed her earrings, duplicate Kitty took off her ring, while the doubles of Scarlett took off her necklace & Shellie removed her bracelet, and finally, Queen Bee removed her hair comb & Wingwoman got rid of her brooch.

"Alright, now's the time for Kai to do her part of the plan." Kara said, climbing back up the baton that Kitty had extended once more. Looking up to her younger sister, Kara shot Kailie a confiding grin & gave her a thumbs up while tightly gripping Kitty Noir's silver pole. Nodding back to Scarlett Fox, Shellie removed her turtle-like shield & delicately set it down to the ground, putting her left foot onto it while using her right to push herself off. Sliding quickly off the bridge & down the street, Shellie literally swept the Acrobat off of her feet & got rid of her sister's illusions, holding the regal purple-colored villain over her shoulder as she sild through the dark streets of Paris, the city's only sources of light being the lampposts, some lights turned on inside certain citizens' homes that were visible since their windows were open, & of course, the large moon and all the small, twinkling stars.

"Hey! Let me go!" The Acrobat angrily shrieked, demanding for Kailie to put her down.

"Nope, I've gotta get you to Ladybug so she can stop you." Kailie said, rocking her feet & hips side to side in order to manage the movements of her shield that she was using as a snowboard.

Once she'd reached the next point location in Maddie's plan, she quickly turned to the side & repeated the same movements, striving to reach the destined spot where Maddie & Rebecca would be waiting for her. Looking up to the rooftops, she saw her best friend Kitty using her baton to hop off & onto the rooftops of all the buildings, from large houses to stores & apartment buildings, with her ears looking a bit darker than usual, which was probably where Wingwoman had located one of her powerup butterflies to go on Emma's costume. Looking back up ahead, she saw Queen Bee, Ladybug, & Tropica all there waiting for her, all looking ready to take on their parts in the plan. Throwing the Acrobat behind her, Kailie hopped off of her shield and put it back on her back. Kailie stood next to Kitty, who both had given her a high five. Once the Acrobat was back on her feet, Tropica, who stood in a nearby alleyway corner, blew one of the feathers she'd plucked off of one of her fans towards Acrobat, with the feather landing right on the golden "A" decal on the purple suit. The feather's effect resulting in a hypnotization of the Acrobat, Jade spoke to her in a convincingly nice-sounding tone.

"Acrobat, I am Tropica. You've been wronged by these so-called heroes, and I am here to help you get the revenge to deserve." With those words, the order Jade had instructed to the Acrobat afterwards sent her marching towards Ladybug, Queen Bee, & Kitty Noir, all using their individual attacks to finish off the plan. When activating the Lucky Charm, Maddie surprisingly wasn't given anything, so that was purely the reason why she'd thought up her entire plan to defeat the Acrobat. How exactly did they defeat the Acrobat? Simple. Queen Bee used her Venom to immobilize Acrobat & trap her in a still form, then Kitty used her Cataclysm to destroy where the source of the Acrobat's power was: Her royal purple-&-gold headband, the place that Maddie had guessed the bad energy lied in, her shockingly being correct on that behalf. Lastly, Ladybug used her yoyo to take away the small little vampire bat that'd came out of the now demolished headband when Emma had used Cataclysm on it, which was much rather a shock, considering that Hawk Moth was in prison & Vivienne had the Butterfly Miraculous. But Maddie didn't care how it happened or getting to the bottom of the mystery immediately, all that mattered was making others safe & defeating the Acrobat. Just as the Acrobat had been defeated & the other girls had all had a quick celebratory cheer, which had included Scarlett Fox & Wingwoman, who'd gotten back just in time to celebrate their victory with the other girls. Just as they'd finished chatting & singing short, funny celebration songs together, Maddie's rolled up yoyo beeped, causing her to press the top button & open it up.

"Who is this?" She curiously asked, all the other girls peeking over her shoulder to see the actions happening on the screen.

"Ladybug." The person appearing on the screen wore a black ski mask with a sinister & malicious voice, topped off with the figure wearing a dark burgundy cloak. "I see you and Kitty Noir, Scarlett Fox, Shellie, Queen Bee, Wingwoman & Tropica defeated my newest masterpiece, Acrobat."

"Who are you?" She asked in a four-way voice mix sounding of fright, confidence, curiosity, & courage.

"I am no other than Red Robe, Paris's first villain in nearly two decades. I strike my dark forces on the city in hopes of getting the revenge on the heroes that deserve it. You may have won this time, but be warned, Ladybug. I will come out as the champion one day, just wait & see." The figure sinisterly cackled, the screen going black not a second later with the yoyo's video chat screen turning off.

"Well, that was quite strange." Maddie commented while walking a little farther away.

"Tell me about it," Kara sighed, chuckling.

"But hey, that mystery can wait for tomorrow, right now, let's go to Le Grande Paris and have some fun!" Rebecca cheered in a bubbly voice. The other girls cheered in agreement, with Maddie watching them all, smiling at her new team. Things were surely looking up; and this year wouldn't just mark the beginning of her first year of high school, it was also the start of a new adventure, along with a great mystery to solve.

* * *

It was already 10:30 at night, and the 7 new superheroes made their way to the Le Grande Paris, all chatting & smiling. Rebecca & Maddie stood far behind the others, both of them just taking their time, chatting, & enjoying themselves. The only reason they'd been able to go to Rebecca's mother's hotel was because all of the other kids' parents were busy, so having all of the kids in the same place would be a great solution for each family. With a somewhat long yet short silence in the air, the halting quiet manner that was so silent, a pin could be heard dropping was broken by Maddie jokingly asking Rebecca a question, one that made them both laugh a little.

"So, since we've already celebrated amongst each other, what should we do once everyone hears of tonight & we all celebrate in a big event?" Maddie asked Rebecca. Since Maddie wasn't really that into throwing parties & planning events for others, she knew Rebecca would be perfect to ask, considering how great she was at throwing birthday parties for her friends, but Maddie only knew since she would occasionally anger-stalk Rebecca's social media pages, but those days were long over now. Rebecca chuckled at that, then giving Maddie a short & silly response.

"We'll just throw a Le Grande Victoire Soiree, sweet little Madeline." Rebecca giggled, patting Maddie's head. When saying that, Rebecca knew exactly what it meant, although Maddie didn't have a clue.

"What's that?" Maddie asked in curiosity, tilting her head to the side.

"It means a "The Big Victory Party", silly!" Rebecca laughed out loud. "Can't believe you don't know French when we literally live in France." Maddie was fast to make a playful yet teasing gesture back to Rebecca, gently elbowing her in the chest.

"C'mon, betcha can't catch up with me!" Rebecca laughed, quickly running ahead of Maddie, her now being just behind the other girls.

"How do you run so fast?" Maddie asked while walking right up next to Rebecca, puzzled.

"When your dad's a professional world-famous runner, it's kinda in your blood." Rebecca shrugged, laughing. Maddie smiled & let out one more laugh at that, then clutching Rebecca's hand in hers tightly. She looked straight ahead, a large & proud smile on her face. Things had definitely changed: She'd befriended three of her old enemies, was Paris's newest superhero, & was going to solve a mystery & uncover the truth behind a new & malicious nemesis. Life was surely going great for Madeline Agreste.

* * *

**A/N: And that's a wrap for chapter 2! I hope you all enjoyed it; I'm quite proud of putting over 12K words into it, which isn't including this A/N, it definitely paid off! By the time you're reading this, I'm probably already working on chapter three, so stay tuned. Please read & review, & offer your best advice. That being said, I feel that I should clear up a few things inside this story so nobody gets confused:**

**\- Marinette, Adrien, & their kids all live in the Agreste mansion in my story, but they sometimes sleep over at her parents' house & they still live there, considering that Marinette co-owns the Dupain-Cheng bakery with them in here. Marinette mainly stays at her parents' house to help them & work on her fashion empire in the morning/afternoon, but besides that, she stays at the mansion watching her son & doing basic things.**

**\- I made Hawk Moth defeated in here, & he now resides in prison. As for Nathalie, she helps out Marinette with her fashion & everything else, now working as her & Adrien's personal assistant.**

**\- Chloe owns her dad's hotel now, & Kim became a pro runner, so that's the sense/plotline I'm following on Rebecca talking about her dad being a world-famous runner.**

**-I know that the part about Red Robe seems fishy & mysterious, but I have a very good outline on where that part's gonna be going soon! You'll understand by at least chapter 4-5, where things will I'll go in-depth on the mystery & how the girls solve it. I also know I didn't tie up some loose ends, but I will very, very soon in future chapters.**

**-Kailie & Emma are both the new Carapace (Kailie) & Cat Noir (Emma), but considering that they're girls & their dads obviously aren't, I changed up the names to make them a bit more feminine.**

**\- I am aware that when Nathalie had the Peacock Miraculous and was named Mayura, but I changed it to the name Tropica, mainly because I liked the name, it sounded like a well-done hero name, & I liked the idea of Jade being the Peacock with the personality changes & development I have planned for her.**

**\- Yes, Maddie's middle name _is _after Marinette's mother XD.**

**At any rate, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, please make sure to review & predict what you think will happen next! Xoxo, Syd/SwagaliciousWillowbrook**


	3. Kitty Noir vs Spellbinder

**A/N: There are several minor time skips for this chapter, all fully intended due to not having any ideas for the scenes, so please, no hate on not seeing more than expected. However, I _will_ clear some loose ends up by having the characters explain what wasn't written themselves, just to make things easier. Otherwise, enjoy, read, and review as always. I would love the feedback from you guys. Speaking of which, an extra special thanks to all of the reviewers and followers of/people who favorited this story. And now, the crew's next adventure begins.**

* * *

It was the end of the school day on Wednesday, only a single day after the newest heroes' late-night adventure, and Emma held her head up high as she walked down the hallway and exited the school door, her smile bright and happy. The silence that rung in her ears lasted far longer that she'd expected it to, at least until her peace and quiet was intruded by an excited Rebecca, Emma being surprised to see her considering her suspension for the rest of the week. Rebecca was running towards her and swinging a sheet of paper in the air, Kara and Maddie running close behind her, both struggling to catch up.

"Emma! Emma!" Rebecca excitedly exclaimed, running fast. "You're not gonna believe this!"

Stopping her speedy run just under a couple feet ahead of Emma at the bottom of the stairs, she reached her arm over and handed Emma the colorful sheet of paper, it reading,

_Middle & High School Talent Show Saturday! Signup Deadline Thursday 3:30, Auditions Friday 5:00_

With her seeing that, Emma could've sworn that her heart actually skipped a beat or two. She'd always wanted to try out for a school talent show back in elementary, but never could find the courage to actually dare herself to take a chance and sign up. But ever since entering the sixth grade, it'd felt like her self-confidence just magically came to her, like _that_.

"Really?!" The younger girl exclaimed in disbelief, her green-blue eyes that looked like both her parents' individual eye colors combined twinkling under the sunlight. "That's awesome, sign me up!" She eagerly exclaimed, forcefully gripping Rebecca's shoulder and twirling the honey-brunette around in an excitable feeling. Their short little interaction was then interrupted by the exhausted figures of Kara and Maddie, them both desperately clinging onto Rebecca and Emma for stability. Kara was somewhat blinded by the flaming sunlight, tracking her way up Rebecca's legs in order to regain her balance. Maddie grabbed onto Emma, the younger girl then helping up the elder of the two sisters by picking her up by the hands; in which Maddie had been satisfied about her sister's kind favor.

"D-did sh-she tell you about the-the talent show?" Kara asked through panting and labored breaths, her hands on her knees as she slightly stumbled across the sidewalk catching herself from falling on her face with her hands. Getting back up and on her feet, she dusted her hands off on her pants before gazing over to Emma, Kara still a little breathless from running as she began to tip over again.

"Yes, Kaye," Emma chuckled, helping up her other older sister figure. "She told me, and I'm so in!" She cheered, throwing her arms up in the air with Rebecca, Kara, and Maddie. Just as they were about to leave, Kailie came running out of the door, her hair floating behind her in the breezy wind. Lilli followed behind her, but she wasn't doing much of anything.

"S-sorry I'm late!" She said, shielding her eyes from the light. "I had to help Ems and I's teacher with something. So, what're we doing?" She asked.

"Well, Mad had it planned for us to go on an afterschool adventure and just have fun, but unfortunately, Tropica and Win-" Rebecca began, Kara then putting her hand over her friend's mouth.

"Shh!" She hissed. "You can't say their hero names at school, there's still people around & they could discover our secret! So, call them by their names, not _their names_." Kara added, emphasizing the words with a slight hissing noise on the final "their names" part to hint to Rebecca what she'd referred to. At first, Rebecca looked quite clueless, but she then realized it after a few seconds of thinking.

"What do yo- _oh, _right." Rebecca sighed in embarrassment, hitting herself on the head. "I should've used their name-names instead of _the names_."

Right, it's fine, just don't do it again," Kara warned, the strict and main reason that she'd warned Rebecca being the fact that there were so many others standing around them. "We can't risk anyone finding out, after all, some people could use it against us."

"True," Rebecca nodded. "Especially she-who-shall-not-be named Anciel." She added, giving an obvious hint to her ex-bestfriend Brooke, rolling her eyes. As she was about to add something more to be conversation, Vivienne and Jade walked up behind her and Maddie, whom she stood next to.

"Unfortunately, I still have to see her on every Take Your Daughter To Work Day," Vivienne sighed in despair. "Considering that our dads' comic empire's been booming with success, they're still gonna make new ones." Her unexpected addition to their group's woes about Brooke and the conversation on their secret being busted had caused Rebecca to jump up into Maddie's arms, which'd made her frown a bit in irritation before she'd burst out laughing at Rebecca's antics. As Maddie was setting Rebecca back onto her feet, Jade added her input on the situation.

"Ugh, let's not even mention her name in the same part of a sentence as the word 'superhero'," Jade scoffed, rolling her eyes. "If anything, she's worse than Red Robe and his villains are." She joked, causing Kara to choke on the water she'd been drinking; who then added her own snarky commentaries.

"If anything, I wouldn't be surprised if she is Red Robe!" Kara laughed, arms crossed. "After all, they both love red, hate us with a burning passion, and pretty much everything under the sun you could name in a sitting. If she wants to be a double-"

Maddie snickered at that, covering her mouth with her hand while she crouched over from her hard, breathless laughter a little bit later.

"I-I can't right now," she wheezed. "It's funny because it's so true." She agreed. After a second or two, it was no longer just Maddie laughing, the entire group was laughing harder than ever.

"Stop it," Jade cackled, her breaths shortening by the second. "I can't breathe." She muttered out, looking over to Vivienne and Rebecca, who were both laughing their heads off as well together, while Kara, Kailie, and Emma all snickered too, although they weren't laughing nearly as hard as the others were. Once the crew had finally stopped laughing, which had taken them all a bit to calm down, they returned to what they were doing before. After each one of them had gotten back up and were on their feet again, they heard a familiar yet sinister voice talking from behind them, the clicks of the supposed she's shoes being heard as well. And of course, it had to be the one and only Brooke.

"Well, well, well," she began, smirking as she placed her hands on her hips, her voice's snarky tone causing the others to dart their heads around instantly, all frowning when seeing her enter. "If it isn't the Traitor Gang, plus their two middle school sidekicks." She snickered, causing all of the girls to get mad, Rebecca and Jade in particular. After a brief period of silence, Brooke walked over to Vivienne and whispered something in her ear that none of the other girls could seem to make out that well.

"Just so you know, I heard some words from a certain person that your chances of winning the art contest are pretty much over," Brooke whispered in a menacing tone. "Can't say I blame the moderators for the competition, though, I'd deny anything sent from you in a heartbeat." She smirked, then walking away, her body language speaking like nothing just happened. After she was out of their eyesight, Vivienne looked down to the ground, glossy tears forming in her eyes as her bottom lip quivered. Turning her head to the side to see her best friend beginning to lightly cry, Rebecca pulled Vivienne over and rested her head onto her shoulder. Softly stroking her best friend's head and the back of her neck, Rebecca reassured Vivienne with kind, loving words.

"Shh, shh," Rebecca said. "Vivi, it's okay. We don't need her anyways, and remember, she was never our friend to begin with. She _used_ us." Rebecca told her, holding back a slight choke in her voice when saying the word "used".

"Rebel's right," Jade agreed. "Plus, who wants to listen to a two-faced, backstabbing brat anyways? Don't let her bring you down, Viv."

"Alright," Vivienne muttered, slightly smiling as she wiped the tears from her eyes, then wrapping her arms around Jade and Rebecca's shoulders to give them a tight hug. "You guys are the best." The trio's warm embrace was then interrupted by a beeping sound coming from someone's phone, Maddie's to be specific.

"Who's that?" Kara asked.

"I don't know," Maddie said. "But I'll see." Reaching into her pocket to find out what her message was about and who it was from, her phone began to buzz again once she'd touched it, sending strange vibrations through her body. Picking up the phone and opening up her messaging feed to see who it'd been from, she couldn't seem to find the mysterious text that'd just been sent to her. Maybe she hadn't looked enough? Maddie's eyes scrolled up and down the list of phone contacts punched into her inbox, doing a quick double check; but still, she couldn't and didn't find it. From her parents, Aunt Alya and Uncle Nino, Aunts Rose and Juleka, her newly added chats with the Formerly Mean Trio, and the others along with Lilli. But all of those messages were either from a few days or weeks ago, and the ones with Jade, Rebecca, and Vivienne weren't filled with any sent messages yet. Who exactly could be the one sending her the messages?

"Who is it?" Jade asked, peeking over her new friend's shoulder. Before she knew it, all of the girls were gathered around her to see.

"I don't know," Maddie sighed, scrolling down a little more on the screen. "Wait! There it is." After a minute of searching for the new message and finding it, Maddie eagerly clicked on the link to the private chat. Surprisingly, there wasn't exactly any typed words, but there was a notification that popped up, saying that she was receiving a video call from an unknown number. Tapping the rectangle box gently with her thumb, Maddie's phone screen turned from a section of rectangular boxes into a video chat sent from Red Robe in a blink.

"Hello, Super Squad," Red Robe began in a different voice tone than last night, all the girls moving from behind Maddie, now forming in a half-ring shape. "I see your lives have returned to normal."

"What's up, Robe Noob?" Kara scowled at him, shooting a dirty look towards the supervillain.

"Wait, how do you know our true identities?" Emma asked, a look of fright and curiosity on her face.

"I do my research," Red Robe sinisterly informed Emma, her now hiding behind Rebecca and clasping her older teammate's shoulders. "Plus, the sounds of your voices are so obvious. How would you all expect to be the children of one or two celebrities and not get recognized? Sounds quite clueless for _superheroes _if you ask me." He evilly spat out, earning an angered reaction from Jade.

"Hey, I'm not clueless!" She yelled angrily, charging towards Maddie in order to smash the phone in response to Red Robe, but Kara and Vivienne had stopped her from doing so. "Plus, you're one to talk." She pouted, making a dissatisfied face and crossing her arms in between her chest and abdomen.

"Alright, I think it's best to stop now, Angst Princess." Kara joked.

"Do you even know the word angst's meaning?" Jade rolled her eyes at Kara.

"Okay, maybe you're right," Maddie shrugged as she spoke to Red Robe. "But still, what's your deal with us?" She asked the cloaked villain.

"Hmm, do you want the full or short story?"

"Full."

"Well, let's get started," he began mysteriously, all the other girls gathering around Maddie again. "First things first, I was ghosted by your parents when we were young, so that was one of my driving motivations to become Red Robe. Second, I was a lonely kid in my younger years, also adding to the factor. And finally, the failure of my dream of being a superhero alongside Ladybug and Cat Noir also sent me over the edge, as you may have predicted. Since you don't have any more questions, I suppose I announce that our battle isn't over. You'll see soon, Hero Squad, just wait and see." He finished, pressing some sort of button that caused the screen to buffer with black-&-white lines across Maddie's phone.

"And we thought he couldn't get any weirder," Emma said, innocently shrugging her shoulders.

"True." Kara agreed.

"You guys are right, so we need to be on full patrol for any new villains that could strike," Maddie affirmed. "But for now, let's go have some fun!" She cheered, pumping her arms into the air.

* * *

The girls were already done with having their share of fun for the day, all now ready to go home at 6:25 PM. Sitting on the subway, right in between Kailie and Maddie, Emma held her notebook and began to write down ideas for what she could do in the talent show. Tapping her pencil on the spiral rim of the blue composition book, Emma rested her elbow on her knee and set her forehead down on her hand. Thinking about what her special talent would end up being, Emma was stopped from her thinking by the train coming to a screeching, jerking stop. Falling over onto Kailie's shoulder, Emma's notebook fell off of her lap and slid across the train's grimy floor, landing right in front of Kara's feet, who was sound asleep while leaning her head on Vivienne's shoulder, who looked a bit confused, per say. Thankfully, since she was such a heavy sleeper, she didn't seem to notice. Jade however, did find Emma's notebook and picked it up, returning it a brief second later. After they'd all began walking out of the subway, Jade had whispered to Emma and asked her a minor question.

"If you ever need help deciding on your act for the talent show soon, feel free to text me for help." Emma felt quite confident and positive on getting Jade's help on the decision of her talent show performance, considering that she didn't have a permanent answer on what she wanted to do yet, Jade was the perfect person to get help with on that, yet with her fair-reasoned sense of advising for others. Plus, she was already someone that Emma knew and trusted.

"Sure," Emma nodded without hesitation. "I'll come." Jade happily replied almost immediately, then grabbing Emma's arm and dragging her up the subway station stairs so they could go to Jade's house.

"Great!" The older girl cheered, running up the stairs as she dragged Emma behind her. But she wasn't finished there; she still had to alarm Maddie about her taking Emma over to her house so Maddie wouldn't grow suspicious or get worried for her sister. "Hey, Mad, Ems's coming to my house so I can help her choose her talent show act, we'll see you later!" She shouted, dragging Emma up the stairs faster then she was a second ago, Maddie responding with an awkward and confused wave. Then, the confused Ladybug asked Kailie a question, who held her older sister Kara in her arms, struggling to walk from carrying the weight of her sleeping older sister in her arms bridal style.

"Do you know what _that _was right there?"

"Nope," Kailie responded, shaking her head and popping the "P" loudly. "But it must be important for them."

"True." Maddie agreed. "Here, lemme help you with Kara, I know just what'll wake her up." She said with a plotting smirk. Curious as to what she'd do to wake up Kara, Rebecca chimed into their conversation with wonder.

"What wakes her up?" She asked, tilting her head to the side. Vivienne and Lilli shared a confused look and shrugged, then directing their sight back towards Maddie, who let out a shy giggle when hearing Rebecca's question.

"You'll see now," she snickered, covering her mouth with her hand. "Kara, Jagged Stone's here and wants to talk to you!" Of course, tricking Kara with the impression that her favorite rockstar was in their area would surely wake her up, and normally as expected, she jumped up and out of Kailie's the second she heard his name used.

"Did you say Jagged Stone?!" She eagerly explained in a happy voice, her fists pumped and arms bent while she bounced up and down, in complete fangirl mode. The other girls giggled at her, Kara being disappointed at first, but eventually, she brightened up and laughed with her friends.

* * *

"So, what exactly are you gonna do to help me discover what I want to do for the talent show?" Emma asked Jade as she pulled her down the surprisingly empty streets of Paris, Emma moving her feet cautiously so she wouldn't trip or run into anything. They'd been walking together for at least a half hour, but there hadn't been a word of conversation between the two since they'd gotten off the train, at least until now, that was.

"To my house," Jade grinned, having a sense that she knew what she was doing. "Although, you should definitely be prepared to be ambushed by my little sister Violet once we get home. Since the 1st grade hasn't been doing her many favors in making friends, she's always wanting to hang out with me and whatever friend in my circle that comes over to our place. But hey, that's just a warning, she could surprise us." Jade chuckled.

"You're right, but if she does want to spend time with us, I don't really mind it," Emma said with a smile and a shrug. "I love kids, but then again, I'm probably biased from growing up with a little brother."

"Hmm, maybe you're right," Jade suggested, rubbing her chin with her thumb. "Also, I've got just the person to help you find out what your senses _truly _want you to choose." Jade smirked, making a gun shape with her finger and thumb and swinging her arm back, guaranteeing that her assistance to Emma would definitely help her.

At first, Emma wanted to ask Jade who it was and beg to know who the mystery person was. But then again, she was Lilli's cousin, and after the "surprise" Lilli had thrown into Maddie's path yesterday that'd paved the way to Jade and the others' redemption, not that it wasn't a good thing, it'd just been a not-so-great surprise at first, that was, so Emma wasn't very sure on that theory. Their silence was then broke by Jade a few minutes later, who asked Emma and important but simple question.

"So, what were some of your options for your act?" Jade asked, turning her head to face Emma. Emma was a bit tongue-tied at that, since she had several options but wasn't so sure on any of them.

"Um..." She began, stuttering. "I was thinking about doing a song and piano performance, but I don't have a song to do yet. But if you're entering, what're you gonna do?" Jade was quick to respond, showing some interest in Emma's idea and giving a bit of info on her talent act, which supposedly involved Kara and Lilli.

"Hmm, that's a good idea! If you want, I can help you choose a song for the show." Jade said, her reply giving Emma a little bit of reassurance. "Also, Lilli, Kara, and I are all doing our three-woman comedy show for the contest: JKL!" She said, doing a bit of jazz hands. Emma looked a bit confused at first on what their comedy group's name meant, but then realized it.

"What does JKL mean - oh. I've got it. Jade, Kara, and Lilli, nice name." She complimented. "And sure!" Emma smiled in agreement to Jade's offer.

"Glad to know you liked the name, Kara came up with it," Jade smiled, bowing. "Also, we're here!" She announced, using her hand to point to where her house was on the large street filled with apartment-like houses, all large in their size.

"Woah," Emma said. "And I thought my house alone was huge." She joked.

"Ha, good one," Jade responded. "Come on now, let's go!" She exclaimed, dragging Emma up the small staircase to the door, it already being open. Jade stepped in the door, then alarming her parents about her being home.

"Mom, I'm home!" Jade yelled. As soon as she'd said that, small pitter-patter noises could be heard from upstairs, then trailing their way down to the living room. Once the slightly loud thumps were no longer heard anymore, Jade's little sister Violet could be seen running towards Emma and Jade, then jumping straight onto her older sister.

"Jadey!" Violet cried in excitement, wrapping her small arms around Jade's back. "I missed you!" Jade smiled warmly at her little sister's actions, then responding to Violet with a small joke.

"I missed you too, Lettie," Jade grinned, patting Violet's back. "But oxygen's starting to become a pressing issue here." She laughed, Emma chuckling too.

"Good one, Jay," Emma complimented, bending down to give the nearly crushed form of Jade a high five.

"Thanks, Em," Jade grinned, now sitting up with her younger sister on her lap. "And Mom? Can you help me with Violet?" Jade asked for Kagami's help in weaning Violet away from her, in which Kagami chuckled as she walked over to assist her older daughter. Picking up Violet gently, Kagami wrapped her arms around her younger daughter as she propped her up onto her hip and tapped the tip of Violet's nose. Helping Jade up, Emma looked around to see if she could try to find the place that Jade had been talking about. Taking the time to just gaze around the large room and soaking up its sight, Emma internally grinned. The white, gray, and black decals of the luxurious living room entranced her, not just for the spotlessness of it, but the vibe of the room gave Emma a sense of comfort.

"Alright, now," Jade said, walking over to Emma and grabbing her hand lightly. "Let's go, I have a feeling that my assistant in helping you will give you the boost you need." She cheekily grinned to Emma, guiding her down one of the several hallways that were connected to the living room.

"So, who exactly is this person you got to help me out with my talent act?" Emma asked. "I'm getting tired of waiting, Jade, you know you can just tell me."

"You're gonna find out in a minute!" Jade told her, sounding a little frustrated. "Chill, Em." She said. After a few more seconds of walking down the spotless white hallway, Jade and Emma reached the room that Jade had been referring to. Looking to the side, Emma saw a sliding wooden door that was cracked open a bit, causing her to stare at the entryway with curiosity and confusion. Jade opened up the door a small bit more, then peeked her head in to alarm whoever was inside of the closed off room.

"Em's ready," Jade whispered to the person inside the room. Emma peeked in too, seeing a brown-haired woman who's back faced her and Jade, although she seemed completely aware of their presence.

"Ah, I see," the woman said. "Come in, girls." Jade took that as their cue to enter the room, sliding the door open fully so both she and Emma could enter at once. Kneeling down onto a yoga mat, Jade set her hands on her knees and gripped them, giving Emma a nod which indicated that she had to do the same. Getting down on the second yoga mat awkwardly, Emma glued her eyes to the back of the mysterious brown-haired woman.

"Um, hello?" Emma said to her. "Aren't you supposed to help me?" She asked, waving her hand irritably. The woman then began to speak to Emma, turning around slowly to face her and Jade.

"I am here to help you, Em-san," the woman added. "Just be patient and you shall see." Donning a hair comb that looked like a cherry blossom, the woman bowed down in front of Emma, leaving her a little puzzled.

"Um..." Emma said, looking to Jade. "Aren't you gonna introduce me to her?"

"Oh, right," Jade chuckled, shaking her head with to regret of her forgetfulness. "Emma, meet my mom's live-in meditation master, Sensei Cersei. And Sensei, meet my friend Emilie, but you can call her Em, Emi, or Emma."

"Uh... hello." Emma said, sheepishly waving. "Should I call you Sensei? Trying to be respectful, and I've seen people call others that in movies."

Cersei giggled at Emma's antics, then signaling Jade to perform one of their usual traditions.

"Jade?" She asked. "Would you mind giving Emilie-san the special drink?"

"Sure." Jade responded quickly, bowing her head and running over to where a cherry blossom-printed kettle sat on a wooden stand. Walking back, Jade held something else, looking to be a pot-shaped cup in her left hand, while she gripped the kettle's handle tightly with her right. Setting the cup down in front of Emma, Jade poured tilted the pot, with what looked to be green tea coming out of the spout.

"Do I.. _drink _it?" Emma asked as she picked up the cup, looking over to Jade and Cersei.

"No, it's gonna transform you into Sailor Moon," Jade said, sounding irritated. "Of course you drink it, you stupid cat!" Emma's heart began to rapidly beat at that, since she and the others couldn't risk anyone else aside from their families finding out their alter egos. Jade's face then paled to the point where she was lighter than a snowflake, her then hitting herself on the head of what was probably the hundredth time today.

"Jade-san, whatever do you mean by Emma-san being a 'stupid cat'?" Cersei asked Jade, only for the teenager's face to turn even whiter.

"Oh! Well..." Jade began, trailing off of her sentence with a speechless look as her mouth went out of her control and let out a high-pitched squeak.

"Um," Emma gulped. "It's a personal inside joke! Y'know, everyone my age's a stupid cat nowadays." She joked, shrugging with a fake, embarrassed giggle. "Now, back on topic, what's the green tea supposed to do for me?" She said, throwing the subject out of their way by asking a question on Cersei and Jade's assistance. Holding the cup closer to her mouth, Emma gave her best fake smile, it making her look like her mother from a certain angle.

"You see," Jade explained, moving her yoga mat up so she would now face Emma, then sitting on the mat Indian style. "While green tea isn't purposed to offer concentration, it does give first-time drinkers of it a new perspective in a way. While it may look gross from afar, it tastes better than it looks. The entire point is that if you feel like you don't want to do something when you haven't tried it yet, you will come out with a different look once you've tried it. Think of the green tea prior to tasting it as your feelings on the talent show, and the green tea post to trying it as your feelings if you've done it." She told Emma, giving her new friend a whole different look. Emma thought to herself for a second, taking in what Jade had told her.

_'Hmm, maybe she's right. Well, here goes nothing...' _With no regrets, Emma took a large sip of the green tea, flinching at first when experiencing its taste. It tasted... strange, at first, that was, but after swallowing it, she was shocked in a good way by the flavor. It was a delicious combination of what shared hints of sweet, buttery, fruity, with a bittersweet aftertaste all at once. Sure, it tasted good and all, but Jade was absolutely right; green tea was her song performance in a way. Not wanting anything to do with it at first, but loving it after giving it a shot. Downing it to the very last drop, Emma winced one more time before looking back up to face Jade and Cersei.

"So?" Jade asked, sounding excited. "Do you like it?" Since Emma was a proud jokester who loved to mess with people, she decided to give off an illusion at first to play with Cersei and Jade, but more so towards Jade in particular.

"I don't like it..." Emma began, Jade hanging her head down in disappointment. "I love it!" Emma finished, Jade perking her head back up with happiness, jumping over to hug her friend.

"Don't ever scare me like that again, Em!" She scolded. "I actually believed you there for a second."

"Okay, okay," the younger girl giggled. "I promise." She said, pulling away and sticking her pinkie out so pinkie-swear on it with Jade.

"Now that we've helped you here," Jade said, not entirely finished talking to Emma yet. "You've still gotta try out your song on my piano! Now come on, follow me to the music room." She said, getting up and pulling Emma up with her, then dragging her to the door and exiting.

"Bye, Sensei!" Jade said, turning her head to wave goodbye to Cersei, Emma doing the same. "See you next time!" Peeking her head out the door, Jade then moved away and swiped the door shut again, now guiding Emma back down the hallway so they could enter the music room. This time, Emma couldn't help but ask her friend what they were doing again, just to clarify things. But, she'd decided to wait until they reached the living room again to question Jade on the topic.

"So, you're gonna help me by giving me piano lessons?"

Jade giggled at that, quick to answer Emma with a rather teasy response as she picked up her violin and set it in its case, the violin happening to be jade green. What a coincidence, right? "Who said I was guaranteed to give you lessons _here_? I just so happen to have another special helper for that." She chuckled, dragging Emma again, this time over to the front door. Just so she wouldn't worry anyone with her antics, Jade decided to alarm her mother about where they were going.

"Hi, Mom, bye, Mom!" Jade shouted, pushing open the door as she pulled Emma behind her. Kagami gave a confused laugh, then waving to her elder daughter with a smile.

Once they'd made it outside, Jade walked over to the bike rack, pulling out a tandem bicycle and sitting on the front seat.

"Now, come on, Emilie, we've got 10 miles to pedal and from here, we're a long way from the Le Grand Paris."

"So, you're getting Rebecca to help me?" Emma asked, grabbing one of the helmets and getting on the empty seat of the bicycle.

"Yep," Jade nodded, turning her head to face the younger girl. "She's a real expert, but not as big of one as I am, of course." She laughed, batting her sea blue eyes at Emma, who rolled hers in return.

* * *

"Finally," Emma breathlessly panted, crouching over as she gripped her knees. The two of them had finally made it to the Le Grand Paris, and after what'd felt like hours of pedaling, they made it. "I thought we'd never make it. 10 miles is way longer than it seems..."

"Okay, now I actually agree with you on that," Jade said, her a bit breathless too. "Where the heck is Rebecca at?" She asked, getting a bit tired of waiting, even though they'd just got there. But before Emma could say anything to Jade, they both saw Rebecca quickly running down the stairs to greet them, while Vivienne followed behind her as she struggled to catch up. Barging through the once-closed but now-open door, Rebecca grabbed her friends by their arms, guiding them upstairs to her room.

"So happy that I get to give you lessons, Em!" Rebecca cheered, her now leading all four of her friends back up the staircase. "This is gonna be so great."

Once they'd reached Rebecca's room, Emma was shocked by its size and style. The room was decked out in rose gold, gray, gold, and black, with a queen-sized bed in a velveteen red canopy. Ha, how ironic. A queen-sized bed for Queen Bee. Her pastel pink piano, matched with a bench-like seat of rose gold and velvet red. Sure, there was much more asides from that in the room, but those were the things that'd caught Emma's eye the most.

"Wow!" She exclaimed. "Rebel, your room's beautiful." She complimented.

"Thanks," Rebecca grinned, flicking her honey-brown hair. "My grandma helped me with the designs. We have great taste, don't we?" She grinned, stifling the laugh she wanted to let out. Taking Emma over to the piano, Rebecca sat down next to her as she asked the younger girl a question, standing behind the dark-haired beauty as she set her hands on the younger's shoulders gently.

"Okay, first things first: Do you have any songs you like and want to do, or your own handwritten songs to perform? This'll be your start to finding out how you want to do it."

Before Emma could answer on her own, Plagg flew out of her belt bag's open pocket and spoke for her, but of course, he was incorrect. "The little cat's not exactly sure yet, but then again, she is her father's daughter yet with how indecisive they both are." Emma flicked Plagg in his small stomach for that, sending him a little farther from where he levitated above.

"You wanna be quiet and let me speak for myself, or have me flick you 50 more times and send the camembert flying straight out your big, fat mouth?" Emma snapped, hands and arms folded on her chest tightly. Rebecca giggled at that, but yet again, her kwami Pollen stepped in at Emma's defense, giving a stern and harsh warning to the cat-like kwami.

"Plagg, you should know that Emma's been nervous, so you should try to be nice to her!" Pollen scolded, sticking her head out of where she hid inside Rebecca's jacket pocket. "Go back to stuffing your face with cheese." Emma, Jade, Vivienne all looked quite entertained by the kwamis' little sparring match, but Rebecca however, wasn't having it and wanted to just help Emma.

"Alright, can you two stop fighting?" She hissed, sounding annoyed with their little argument. "Pollen, you're right and all in the sense where Em needs help, but seriously, no more fighting!" With that, Pollen went fully back inside Rebecca's pocket while Plagg went back inside Emma's belt bag, her zipping it shut so he couldn't come out again.

"Alright now, let's get back on topic." Rebecca said, turning her head to Emma and clapping her hands together, a loud banging sound filling the once silent air. "Like I said, it starts with you choosing a music genre. Like, what do you want to do? If you don't know yet, Vivienne and I prepared some examples for you." She said, Emma nodding in agreement to Rebecca and Vivienne's offer. "Viv, would you mind?" Rebecca said, pointing over to her redhead best friend. Turning on the pastel pink mini speaker on Rebecca's desk, the stereo played a loud, eardrum-shattering rock song.

"Rock!" Rebecca exclaimed. "Do you like it?" Emma responded quickly, but she didn't say anything positive about the hard rock music.

"It's fine," she shrugged. "But I hate the feeling it gives my ears more than Plagg's cheese's stench." Jade giggled at that, then adding her own thoughts into the mix.

"I don't think it's that bad, but then again, when you grow up with a world-famous rockstar for a dad, you kinda get used to it after a while."

"Now," Rebecca said, sounding peppy. "Vivienne, try option two." This time, Vivienne turned on a country song. Emma liked the song, nodding her head to the beat, but it didn't exactly sound like something she could play on a piano.

"I like it, but I don't think it's piano material." Emma said, a stern and unimpressed look on her freckled face. Rebecca sighed again, and Vivienne played a third song. This time, it was something more... jazzy for a piano player's expertise, so yet again, Emma denied it. "Too fast."

Rebecca sighed again, just before announcing that she only had one option left. "Well, there's only one genre left that we haven't tried. Vivienne?" The song then switched to a slower and more soulful song, and Emma went silent so she could her it better. Nodding her head and grinning from ear-to-ear, Emma responded to Rebecca with a finally positive answer, making the older girl scream with relief.

"It's perfect!" Emma squealed, smiling wide and bright. "I'm definitely performing something in that genre."

"Great!" Rebecca cheered loudly, jumping up from where she stood. "Vivienne, get my microphone set, and Jade, get your violin, we're gonna help Em make a song!" Rebecca squealed, gathering all her friends together and pulling the group into a hug. Faces squished and a bit surprised in Rebecca's hug, the moment of peace between the quartet was interrupted by the door opening, Kara, Kailie, and Maddie all standing there. Kara looked around the room to see if she could find them, and once she did, she laughed at them with amusement.

"Did I miss anything?" She laughed. "Looks like Rebel got deep into bonding time." Kara joked, a smug grin on her face.

"Nice one, Kaye," Rebecca said sarcastically, separating herself from the other girls and ending the hug. "Not." She scowled, crossing her arms.

"Alright, alright," the brunette giggled with a shrug. "I kid. But due to "extreme circumstances", we got here a _bit _later than we were supposed to." Rebecca responded to that quickly, a sarcastic tone in her voice as she smirked, trying to hold back her snickers.

"So being nearly three hours later than you were supposed to be is 'just a bit'?"

"You win," she sighed. "Unfortunately..." She whispered the last part under her breath carefully, but luckily for her, Rebecca still heard it, but played like she didn't to keep Kara calm.

"So, how're we gonna help Em make her song?" Maddie asked. "After all, she's only got until tomorrow afternoon to sign up, so we've gotta hurry if we wanna make it in time before the deadline, and it doesn't help that she doesn't have an original song to perform either." The older Agreste sister frowned.

"Already got it covered," Vivienne grinned. "Jade's walking away from the JKL comedy group to be a backup violinist of Emma, while Rebecca and I are gonna be her backup singers!" She smiled.

"What?!" Kara exclaimed, sounding irritated and shocked. "Bu-but we need Jade with us!" She protested, but not for long until her taupe-brown eyes darted over to where Maddie stood on her left, shooting the emerald-eyed a look that said she wanted the midnight-haired heroine to take place as the third person in their comedic act.

"Whatcha say?" Kara teasingly smirked, hands on her hips as she leaned over to see her best friend better. "Wanna be in our trio comedy group and make our name KLM instead?"

"Me?" Maddie muttered with a strangled squeak, her finger pointing to herself as her eyes and face contorted with fright. "Are you serious?" She said, her voice sounding more natural this time.

"Yes, I'm serious!"

"Fine," she sighed. "I'll do it. But _only_ if you buy me a kitchen sink ice cream sundae from the mall's parlor once we're done right after." Emma laughed at that, then began to tease Kara about Maddie's blackmailing promise.

"Okay," Kara agreed hurriedly, sounding a bit frustrated by her BFF's blackmail. "_But _only if we fall below the top three or get third place. No more, no less."

"Okay," Maddie OK'd the offer, shaking Kara's hand. "It's on like Donkey Kong, Lahiffe."

"Same goes to you, Agreste."

"Can't believe she pulled the ice cream trick on you," Emma chuckled. "What a classic one. Am I right, Kai?" She asked her best friend, Kara shooting a death glare over to where Kailie sat on a black velvet couch. Kailie nodded with a chuckle, making Kara roll her eyes with irritation.

"Alright!" Rebecca blurted out nervously, clapping her hands together to bring the others' attention to her. "We don't have all the time in the world, so it's best we get started now."

"Right," Emma nodded, slowly running back over to the piano, sitting on the bench. "I've got this." Cracking her knuckles, Emma began to tap a key on the piano, her focus only going to the tune she played vividly.

"I like it!" Jade grinned, nodding her head. "But it's missing something like _this_." She said, opening up her violin case and playing a vivacious and melodic tune to go with Emma's piano skills. Kara and Maddie did a little dance to the beat, while Vivienne picked up a tambourine and started shaking it. Rebecca stood nearby in a chair, observing the others' fun time.

"It's great!" She cheered, givng them two thumbs up as they all nodded and let out happy cries, giving one another high fives. "But how about I'll sing instead, Emma can play the piano, and Jade will do her violin?" She suggested, grinning as she grabbed a mike stand and placed a golden microphone, aka her good luck charm inside of it.

_'This is gonna be great!' _Emma thought. _'The gold is ours.'_

* * *

What had felt like a few hours later, Emma woke up to seeing the beautiful sunrise right in front of her. At first, she wondered how she'd became this way and what caused it, but the memories hit her not even a second later. She remembered the girls practicing all night long, but eventually, Rebecca's mother had came in and alerted the girls about it being nearly midnight, meaning it was far past time to go to bed. Of course, since the others' parents were already occupied with other jobs, they'd all had to stay at Rebecca's place again. Helplessly rubbing her eyes since the barely-risen sun still glared brightly in her eyes, Emma lazily turned over on the guest bed she slept in to get a better look at one of the two clocks, her eyes darting over to Rebecca's wall clock. Squinting her eyes, Emma saw the numbers 6:45 AM and immediately panicked. Hopping out of bed and scrambling over to get some ice cubes out of Rebecca's mini-fridge, dumping them on the other girls as she walked past their beds and some spare sleeping bags they slept inside, only done in order to wake them up.

"Guys, get up! We only have a little over an hour to get to school, and we don't have food or clothes, nor have we showered!" The others all looked a bit irritated with her at first since she'd drenched them in ice cubes, but instantly became alerted and shocked once they'd heard her mention what time it was. All jumping up out of where they laid in their beds and sleeping bags on the floor, running over and all screeching in shock and panic, their panicking cries recited in perfect unison.

"Did you say we only have an hour?!" They all yelled, their faces contorted with panic, disbelief, and so on.

"Yep."

"This is a disaster, a _disaster_!" Jade said, running her fingers through the strands of hair in her scalp as she paced back and forth through the room, her sky blue eyes fluttering. "I've never been late to school once in my life, and if I'm late today, my life is over!" She gasped. Kara laughed at that, then reassured Jade that being a little late wasn't anything big to stress about.

"Jade, chill! You'll just probably end up being late, it's not the end of the universe."

"It is for me!"

"How?" Kara questioned, a clueless look in her amber-taupe eyes. Just before Jade could answer, Rebecca interrupted her, sounding a little overwhelmed about how and when they were going to leave.

"That can wait for later, right now, we need to get to school!" She said, running her Miraculous bumblebee comb through her hair to get rid of any knots or tangles, loosening it up a lot in the process. Tying her hair up into a down, side ponytail, Rebecca ran into her closet to change out of her pajamas into her normal clothes.

"Rebecca, it's okay, don't rush yourself, if you don't, there's a lesser chance that you'll be late!" Pollen reassured her Queen. "Plus, I've had many Queen Bees who show up late to events, and not to mention, you've been suspended for the rest of the week." Pollen reminded Rebecca.

"I know, but still!" Rebecca shrieked, sounding rushed, but not by Pollen. "If we get there early, we have more time to get me, Jade, and Emma signed up for our act in the talent show. Thankfully, Kara already signed her, Mads, and Lil up online, so their sneaky butts lucked out _big _time besides from having to confirm it during a break time on the signup sheet. And I still have soccer practice despite my suspension, it's a sworn rule for us all to be there." She rolled her eyes with jealousy about Kara, Lilli, and Maddie's luck in being signed up over the school's site, then informing Pollen about her promised duty to always be at soccer practice. Surprisingly, Rebecca was quite gifted in changing in and out of clothes super fast, so it took her no time to be in her new pair of clothes. Now satisfied and less anxious, Rebecca exited the closet in her outfit for the day, now completely chill and serene again. The others, however, somehow managed to get dressed in a flash and had, supposedly, per say, already began heading downstairs, without her joining them. Sighing with a pang of irritation, Rebecca ran out of her room's open door, heading for the stairs, considering that her athletic nature had always driven to to take the longer route, but only so she could cut in a bit more exercise. When making her way down the hallway, she was greeted by her faithful butler Jean.

"Do you need help, Miss Kim?" He asked her, slowly walking behind her as she ran. She didn't seem to hear him due to her distraction, but like usual, he didn't mind it one bit, just walking to the playroom to check on her three younger siblings Beatrice, George, and Louis.

"Gotta.. make it.. downstairs.. before... the girls do," Rebecca panted to herself as she ran down the maze-like hallways of the Le Grand Paris, desperately trying to find the way to the staircase. Sure, she'd lived here since she was a baby, but even she of all people could get lost inside such a big building, even if it was her home, despite the fact that she still felt a little asleep. Stopping in her tracks for a minute, Rebecca turned her head to the right, finally seeing the start of the red velveteen-colored staircase, sighing with relief before heading down to the first floor, going a bit slower this time. When reaching the bottom, she saw all the others waiting for her, their eyes glued straight to her as smirks filled up space on their faces.

"Finally! Where were you?" Kara asked, arms crossed.

"Hmm, let's see," Rebecca began, rubbing her chin with her fingers as she spoke in a flat, blank voice. "First things first, _you all _left me in the dust and left my room without me, second, the upstairs hallways are like a flipping maze, and last, I was half asleep and not that focused. Thank you all for coming to my educational speech for the day." She finished her side of the story with a graceful bow, a habit she'd picked up on after attending her bi-weekly meditation appointments with Sensei Cersei on Thursdays and Sundays, which took place every two weeks during the school year, but didn't begin until the second week of school.

"Okay," Kara scoffed, rolling her eyes again. "And now, let's bounce!" She said, running out to the outside patio of the hotel. The others followed right behind her, but Vivienne however, decided to stay behind. Unlike the others, she'd noticed that something looked a little... off with Rebecca today. Stepping towards her honey-brunette best friend, Vivienne gently gripped Rebecca's hand in hers, asking her a sweet and simple question.

"Hey, Becks," she whispered. "Is there anything wrong?"

"Well... kinda," Rebecca shrugged. "You see, I'm just a bit nervous about entering the talent show and singing in my act with Jade and Emma."

"Why?

"Because, I've never really sung in front of people I'm not that comfortable with. Sure, I've sang songs in fronts of my family and you and the girls, but that's because I'm used to being around you guys." She explained.

"Rebecca! It's okay," Vivienne reassured her best friend with a smile. "If you want, I can sketch you some designs for outfits to wear at the show tomorrow night, and you can sew them."

"Alright," Rebecca smiled, letting out a little sigh of relief and smiling. "But please, I'm begging you, _don't _make me look like a fool in my costume while Jade and Em look great in theirs."

"Relax, I wouldn't," Vivienne excused, scoffing with an innocent shrug. "Plus, if I did, it wouldn't be the most embarrassing thing you'd ever wear or do. Remember that time when we were 12 and we ran through my grandpa's police station screaming 'we finally escaped from prison'? Man, was that fun." Vivienne laughed upon a small memory of the two in their preteen years, on the day when they'd been dared by Jade to run through the police station where Vivienne's father worked and scream that they'd escaped from prison, which had resulted in the parents all laughing their heads off and the girls to get banned from the police station for a month. But before Rebecca could voice her opinion on the time that they both remembered and say whether she still felt proud of it or not today, they heard Kara yell from out in the car that Maddie and Emma's family's trusty bodyguard Gorilla, as her father liked to call him, was driving, since he was the one that had to take them all to school, yet with some of the parents being busy with work and some taking their younger children to their own schools.

"Guys, get your butts out here and inside this car before I remove your insides with an ice cream scoop!" She shouted, sticking her head out of the window, cupping her hands and putting them around her mouth to amplify her demand. Since she was sitting in a seat that was right near the open windows, she had an easy advantage at alarming them about leaving. But knowing Kara, she probably sat where she did on purpose, but Maddie swooped in last minute and pulled her away before things could go any further. Rolling their eyes, Vivienne and Rebecca exited the hotel and entered the large SUV, sitting in one of the back rows since there was four minus the driver's and passenger's seats, Rebecca on the right and Vivienne on the left, while Jade sat in the middle, directly between them. After the car had started and they'd been on the road for several minutes already, Rebecca decided to get a touch of innocent payback on Kara for her screaming out of the car window back at the hotel, which had made everybody look at them, and Rebecca surely felt a bit embarrassed by the scenario.

"Hey, Kara," Rebecca said, Kara turning her head to face her friend. "Nice job at making yourself _and _us look like fools with your screeching." She joked, sounding a little miffed over Kara's behavior a few minutes prior.

"Well, I had a reasoning to it!" Kara defended her actions, sounding a little frustrated with a pouty lip.

"How about you _all _shut up so we can enjoy this ride in peace?" Kailie suggested, sounding angrier than her sister did. "Y'know, some people like a bit of calming silence to start their day with." She rolled her eyes.

"Agreed," Jade said. "_Now _are you two done arguing?" She asked Rebecca and Kara sternly, but they didn't respond to either her or Kailie, it definitely being because they knew that they were in the wrong. A little while passed peacefully and felt like a bit of a wait, but they all seemed rather relieved once they'd reached the school, although it could've been sooner if there wasn't all the early morning traffic. Gorilla cleared his throat as the larger-than-average car came to a halting stop, it being the girls' cue to exit the vehicle and begin the school day. Once they'd gotten out and stood on the sidewalk, Maddie had asked her sister a question before they'd split up to go to their individual schools with their friend groups.

"Hey, Em," she said, Emma turning her head in order to face her sister. "Are you 100% sure that you still want to enter the talent show with Rebel and Jade? Because if not, don't feel pressured, it's fine if you don't wanna."

"No, I want to." Emma told Maddie, reassuring her that she had a fully positive view on entering with Rebecca and Jade. "I appreciate your concern, though." Before anything more could be said, both girls heard the individual bells from both the high and middle schools ring, signaling them that it was nearly time to get to their classes, considering the bells rung five minutes prior to.

"Oh, the bell's ringing," Emma exclaimed, running across the grassy field to reach her own school. "Bye, Mad!"

"Bye, Em!"

* * *

When sitting at the desk, patiently waiting for her teacher to come in the classroom so the day could begin, Emma looked around her, her eyes eventually flying to where Kailie sat in her own two-seat desk, since all 14 in the room could fit two people. Kailie and Emma had both been sitting on their own and without others since Monday, and they were both hoping that that would change today. And so it did, according to what Kailie had heard from another friend of hers.

"Hey Em, did ya hear that there's gonna be two new students here today?" She said, Emma hearing her perfectly, yet with her desk being just across the room from her. "They're our age, too, so maybe, we can add two new friends to our group!"

"Really?" Emma smiled in surprise. "Cool." Hearing the door creak and begin to open slowly, their teacher for their first class of the day, it being World History, Ms. Villard aka Ms. V walked in, with what looked to be the two new classmates following behind her. They were both girls; one was short with light blonde-brunette hair and taupe eyes, while the other had medium skin with curly brown hair that went just below her shoulders, wearing a pair of silver reading glasses with blue eyes behind them.

"Class, meet our two new students," Ms. V said. "Kayla Kante and Harmony Bruel." From the looks of it - or at least what Emma understood - Kayla was the one in glasses and Harmony was the short one. Emma then wondered something about their last names, swearing to herself that she'd heard them somewhere before. Of course, since she could get so lost inside her own thoughts, Emma would pay attention to nothing but what she was thinking in the moment, so she didn't even seem to notice Kayla sitting down next to her, while Harmony sat next to Kailie. It then popped in her head that Kante was the last name of the famous videogame-creator Max Kante, who was best-known for his video game 'Miraculous Adventures', which Maddie and Emma grew up playing. And of course, Kayla's stunning crystalline blue eyes could be easily recognized; a feature that she'd inherited from her mother, famous rollerblading captain on France's female roller derby team, Alix Kubdel. Sure, Emma had never once met the couple before, but she did know for a fact that they'd been childhood friends of her parents, since she'd seen so many pictures with them included. Nudging Kayla's shoulder as Ms. V wrote something on the chalkboard, Emma gave her a warm and friendly welcome to the school.

"Hey there!" She said, making Kayla turn her head to her left in order to face Emma. "I'm Emma, but you can call me Em. It's nice to meet you!" She exclaimed with a smile, trying her best to whisper-scream so Ms. V wouldn't catch wind of their conversation.

"Thanks," Kayla grinned. "Emma's your name? Any relation to Marinette Dupain-Cheng and Adrien Agreste's younger daughter? Are you like, _the _teen model or something?" She asked. Emma only could bring herself to grin and let out a small chuckle at that, it was funny how Kayla's little joke turned out be to 100% true.

"Oh." Kayla's face settled down with realization and a bit of embarrassment. "Sorry! I had no idea that you were _actually _her, so my apologies. Now that I looked a bit more, you really look like your mom."

"Really?" Emma answered, sounding amused by Kayla's supposed compliment.

"Yeah!" Kayla nodded. "You really do."

"Thanks," Emma said, grinning from ear-to-ear. "Allow me to reintroduce myself." She stuck her hand out and grabbed Kayla's, giving it a gentle shake as a re-do in her greeting to the new girl.

"The name's Emma. Emma Agreste."

Kayla grinned at that, glad to know that she had made a new friend only on her first day at school. "Kayla," she grinned, shaking Emma's hand back to return the favor. "Kayla Kante." They had had a good first interaction, but of course, all good things must come to an end. Ms. V had caught their friendly conversation.

"Girls!" She scolded, causing them and everybody else to dart their heads towards her in to look at her. "No more talking. Now, do your school." With that, Emma and Kayla looked down at their textbooks, reciting the sentences inside their heads. But when Ms. V had went outside for a minute to get a missing book, Emma whispered to Kayla one more time.

"By the way, Ms. Villard doesn't mean any harm in shushing us up, she only wants for us to get good grades and work hard," Emma reassured Kayla, letting her know that Ms. V was definitely not one of _those _teachers. "So don't feel afraid of her."

"Thanks," Kayla smiled, fist bumping Emma. "Glad to know."

Emma felt quite good about how today was going so far, yet with making a new friend almost immediately just because of who they assumed her parents were, having the hilarious irony of it being completely accurate.

* * *

It was now lunchtime, and all of the older five heroines sat on the floor, using Kara's large buffalo-plaid scarf as a picnic blanket. Maddie, being the typical chatterbox and outgoing ball of energy that she was, had went over to her grandparents' bakery to pick up a cherry pie for the girls, a treat that they all loved.

"It's been a while since Maddie left," Jade commented. "What could be taking her so long?"

"Well, if you've known Mad for a while - like I have - you'd know that when it comes to her, everything takes long than she promises it to." Kara joked, making Rebecca and Lilli giggle.

"Truth be told, she really seems that way," Jade chuckled. "Even when everything goes according to plan for her, the girl _still _takes a long time."

Just then, they heard a cheery voice coming from behind them, turning their heads around to see Maddie walking with caution, holding six medium to large sized boxes in her arms like it was nothing. "I'm back!" She said, beginning to set the dessert boxes down once she reached the picnic blanket.

"Treat yourselves to some chocolate chip cookies, lemon bars, extra chocolate cupcakes, sugar cookies, cherry, apple, banana creme, and strawberry pie, along with some pink lemonade, croissants, baguettes, and all sorts of cake!" She said with joy, doing jazz hands to emphasize her presentation. Vivienne and Rebecca perked up the second they heard Maddie mention chocolate cupcakes, looking inside the boxes through the see-through plastic screens that were built into the white paper-cardboard mix boxes. Finding the box with a dozen-and-a-half cupcakes inside of it, they opened it eagerly and grabbed two out, one for each of them. Jade chuckled at the scene, adding her own commentary in order to try and make the others giggle.

"You two haven't changed one bit," she chuckled, batting her turquoise eyes innocently. "Always first to chow down when chocolate cupcakes are near." Kara and Lilli both giggled at that, but Maddie was so wrapped up in whatever she was doing on her phone that she didn't seem to pay attention to Jade's lighthearted joke.

"Mad?" Kara said in a singsong voice, waving her head in front of Maddie's face. "Whatcha doing?"

"Hmm?" The minty-eyed girl hummed, bringing her head up. "Oh, nothing. Just texting Emma. Apparently, she and Kai are gonna come over here in a few minutes with the two new girls from their school, and of course, we'll need to savor the snacks so our two new potential friends can have some."

Not even five seconds after she spoke, Emma and Kailie along with their two new friends, Kayla and Harmony came over.

"We're here!" Emma excitedly squealed as she took a seat directly next to Jade. Looking over to where Kara, Lilli, Maddie, Vivienne, and Rebecca sat, Emma couldn't help but laugh at seeing the chocolate frosting all over their mouths and noses. "Alright, what did you two do with those cupcakes? Eat or inhale 'em?" She chuckled, the others laughing with her.

"Neither!" Rebecca defended.

"Alright, alright," Emma rolled her eyes, quitting on teasing her friend. "Back on topic, here's two people we'd like you all to meet. Girls, this is Kayla Kante and Harmony Bruel. You might know Kayla as the daughter of the world's most famous videogame creator and the country's roller derby captain, but there's more to her than just that. For Harmony, you'd recognize her as the younger daughter of the power couple consisting of the iconic romantic poet and the incredibly talented actress, but hey, she's a person under that illusion too." Emma said, making Kayla and Harmony smile, both having confidence to know that their new friend liked them for who they truly were, not just because they had famous parents. Of course, Emma completely knew how it was to feel that way, yet with being the child of two of the most popular fashion designers in the world.

"And girls, this is the rest of our crew: Meet Maddie, Kara, Lilli, Vivienne, Jade, and Rebecca."

"Hello!" Maddie greeted them with a bright smile and kind wave.

"These schools are fun, aren't they?" Kara joked. "But seriously, welcome to the school!"

"Hi there!" Lilli shyly waved, a genuine smile on her face.

"Welcome to middle school. Two years of possible torture until you reach the four years of a thrilling haven." Vivienne joked.

"Greetings." Jade said with a bowing gesture, a habit she'd always done when meeting new people from her half-Japanese side.

When they'd reached Rebecca's turn to welcome them, she didn't even speak in English. And of course, she said it in French, yet with it being one of her two lest languages. She spoke some Japanese after spending so much time with Jade, but it definitely was a bit rusty around the edges.

_"Bonjour! Je m'appelle Rebecca, c'est un plaisir de vous rencontrer. Je suis le capitaine de l'equipe de football des filles et j'adore coudre des vetements et regarder mes petits freres et soeurs. S'il y a un conseil que je peux vous donner pour la premiere fois, c'est de rester a l'ecart de Brooke et de ses subordonnes. Juste sur la base de mes experiences avec elle, bien sur."_

"Um... what did she just say?" Kayla asked, but but nobody specific.

Jade responded to her not even half a minute later, using the translation app on her phone to identify what Rebecca had said.

"According to my translator app, she said 'Hello, my name's Rebecca! It's very nice to meet you. I'm the girls' soccer team captain and I love sewing clothes and watching my little siblings. If there's some first-timer advice I can give you, it's to stay away from Brooke and her minions. Just based on my experiences with her, of course.' So, basically a bunch of stuff we can't decode without the glorious creation of translation sites." Jade told Kayla, who chuckled at her remarks.

"Tell me about it," Kayla snorted, sipping some water out of her thermos prior to doing so. "I just moved here from Versailles three weeks ago and was the only one asides from my parents who spoke English back there. So, all I could understand every once in a while asides from the basics I knew was 'Oui oui, croissant!' all the darn time."

"You think _that's _bad?" Maddie challenged, chiming into the conversation. "My dad originally wanted to name me Yu, the Chinese word for Jade. So chances were I could've had the same name as Jade and everyone referring to me as 'Hey, Yu', which is the worst pun to ever exist on planet Earth." That was a fact that she'd never told anyone, not even Emma. The girls all reacted with amusement to her fun fact of the day, with Rebecca snorting, Vivienne giggling obnoxiously, Lilli grinning like a maniac, Kailie bursting out into a fit of laughter, Emma snickering profusely, and Kara choking on the water she drank.

"Yu?" Kara asked, a childish and entertained grin on her face as she laughed at the fact. "I never knew Uncle Adrien was _that _big of a jokester."

"Try living with him," Maddie said, sipping on some strawberry lemonade Sabine had made for the girls. "I love him to death, but his puns and dad jokes get pretty old after a while."

"But then again, he did unleash the inner nerdiness in us," Emma objected. "He is the person who got us to love Sailor Moon and the Pretty Cure franchise, after all. Remember that one year for Halloween when we stayed home and watched four seasons of Sailor Moon instead of actually going trick-or-treating, then we binge-read the entire book series?"

"Oh, yeah!" Maddie exclaimed, reliving one of her favorite childhood memories with a laugh. "I felt at least 20 months pregnant after eating all that candy from the store. And yes, Jade, I know that it's scientifically impossible for that to happen, but hey, humor is humor." She said, giving a short disclaimer so she wouldn't have to end up sitting through one of Jade's scientific lectures. Jade sulked quietly and hung her head down, Lilli patting her on the back.

"So, back on topic," Kayla interrupted, the other girls not seeming to mind. "This Brooke girl, she's... wicked or something? Like a possessed doll from a horror movie?"

"Well, not really," Rebecca answered the younger girl. "But it could make sense if she was. Basically, she was my ex-best friend up until yesterday, turns out she lied to and used me. She told me all these horrible things about Maddie and Emma along with the K's and Lilli, but hey, we're all friends now and have apologized to each other! So everything worked out fine."

"Ugh, your school has one of _those _types of girls?" Kayla asked as she adjusted her silver glasses, looking disgusted. "I had one last year in school."

"Yeah, but it's best to just ignore her," Rebecca suggested, all the other girls nodding in agreement. "And hey, Jade, what'd you and Em do last night at your place?"

"Oh, just some little made-up tradition that Sensei and I wanted to share with Emma," Jade grinned, "Although we might have to permanently drop it once her shrine business begins on Monday."

"Shrine business?" Maddie questioned, popping a small sugar cookie into her mouth after asking. "Like what Rei's family did in Sailor Moon?"

"Well, yes," Jade shrugged. "But this time, the whole family's pitching in to help. Including my parents, sister, all three of my cousins, my aunts, and both my grandmothers, even though they... strongly dislike one another, per say." Jade said.

"Ain't that the truth," a deep voice spoke from behind them, causing all the girls' hearts to jump as their heads darted around. "Even though I don't have any blood relation to Great-Auntie Tomoe, she and Grandma really dislike one another as if they're estranged siblings." Turning their heads around, the girls instantly recognized Lilli's older sister of two years, Juleka's birth daughter Viveka. She preferred to remain anonymous when the school was packed or filled with lots of people, but would gladly go to big events if she felt like doing so. She was in her final year of high school now, and since she'd be going off to college soon, she was trying to make every moment of her senior year last.

"Hey, sis!" Lilli waved, getting up to hug her older sister, who looked rather surprised by her baby sister's actions at first.

"Hey, girls," Viveka shyly waved. That was another similarity that she shared with a teenager version of Juleka; that they were both shy and quiet a majority of the time. "Just wanted to let you know some awesome news!" That time, her voice sounded happier and more lively.

"Well, what is it?" Jade asked.

"I'm gonna be the host of the talent show in two days!" Once Viveka had said that, a light went off in Emma's head, reminding her of something important.

"Oh, shoot!" She screeched, running her fingers through the hairs on her scalp in fright. "I totally forgot to sign Jade, Rebecca, and I up for the talent show!" But before she could move one inch, both schools' bells rang in perfect synchronization, signaling all of the girls that it was time to get back to their next classes.

"Guess you'll have to do it later," Rebecca shrugged as she talked to Emma. "Now go, you don't wanna be late. And as for me, I've got soccer practice for the next three hours, so I guess I _really _lucked out."

Emma sighed as she walked from the grassy field near the outdoor basketball court, soccer field, and outside cafeteria, a bit bummed that she hadn't gotten the chance to sign herself up for the talent show. Looking up at Kailie, Kayla, and Harmony walking in front of her, Emma ran a little so she could catch up with her friends in time for the next class. That wasn't to say she wanted to ditch and go write her name on the sheet, but the good girl side of her didn't want to get in trouble. Oh well, there was always a chance after school ended.

* * *

Standing in front of the bulletin board inside one of the school hallways, Emma picked up the pen they had near and tapped it against the wall, contemplating her decision on their entrance to the talent show. She then decided to look at the sheet's second page and see who was already signed up for the show that would take place in just over 48 hours, because sometimes, knowing your competition could be your best friend in said scenario.

_Acts_

_Melvin Mauque - Acrobatics_

_Kara Lahiffe/Maddie Agreste/Lilli Couffaine-Lavillant - Comedy/Humor/Parody_

_Gawain LeField - Acting_

_Louisa McKaye - Singing_

_Raye Nguyen - Other_

_Maisie Bruel/Victoria Anciel - Acting_

Much to Emma's surprise, only 6 acts were entering the show. Usually, back in elementary school, she would remember there being at least 20 acts in their annual talent shows, so having a quarter amount of that number in this year's contest made her a bit shocked. Knowing that Melvin's act would probably end up in disaster due to his extreme clumsiness, Gawain would be booed off the stage from his pompous and despicable persona, Louisa would end up running off stage with how shy she could be, and Raye was far too aggressive to take place on a stage, her only competition was really the comedic trio and the M&V duo. But then, she saw one more act on the waiting list section, which made her heart stop beating for a mere minute.

_Simon DoMaye - Magic_

Emma felt freaked out for only one reason to be exact. And it was Simon's entrance. For years, ever since the second grade, he had been the tip magician the the whole school district, so we would _definitely_ be a challenge for her to go up against. But still, her heart kept saying that she wanted to enter, so she followed her heart's order, just as her mother had always told her to do. Just as she was about to write her, Jade, and Rebecca's names, Plagg peeked out of one of her pants' pockets and asked her a question, a small hint of a taunting joke included.

"Are you _really _sure you wanna go for this, Clumsy Cat?" He teased. "After all, remember what your dear sister Madeline told you."

"I'm 110% sure, Plagg," Emma assured the black cat-like god, rolling her eyes at his remarks and the very unfortunate nickname he had given her. "And can you please stop calling me that? It's kinda embarrassing." She scoffed with a chuckle. He only chuckled obnoxiously and slid his way back inside her pocket, her relieved that he'd finally left.

"Here I go." She began to write her, Jade, and Rebecca's names out, feeling a little jittery but excited at the same time.

_Emma Agreste/Jade Couffaine/Rebecca Kim - Music/Singing_

"Yes!" She cheered after fist pumping, now making her way to the outdoors area of the high school, since it was right across the soccer field and she could meet up with the others.

Walking across the path that usually led to the soccer field, Emma tried to see if she could spot any of the others. And she surely did. Well, only Rebecca. She looked to be practicing her soccer skills with someone else, who looked remarkably like her.

"Hey!" She yelled, waving her arms in the air. "Beck, it's me!"

Rebecca turned around so she would now turn towards where Emma stood, a little confused at first before recognizing her friend's voice. But sadly for Emma, the girl who Rebecca practiced with kicked their ball too hard, it now flying towards Emma. As hard as she tried to duck and dodge the ball, it didn't work, which ended up in her getting clobbered in the face by the ball. Falling to the floor, Emma cupped her nose and mouth with her hands as she struggled to sit back up, Rebecca running over to help her.

"Em! You okay?" Rebecca asked as she helped Emma up, who still stumbled over her own feet a little.

"Yeah," the dark-haired girl nodded, "At least I didn't get a nosebleed. Speaking of which, who were you playing soccer with?"

"Oh, right!" Rebecca said, sounding eager to introduce the girl she played soccer with to Emma. "Bea, come on over here!"

The girl, who had grayish eyes and dark ashy brunette hair walked over, height measured down to at least Rebecca's shoulders.

"Emma, meet my little sister Beatrice." Rebecca introduced the young girl to Emma, her revealed to be Rebecca's younger sister. "And Bea, meet my good friend Emma. She's Auntie Mari and Uncle Adri's daughter."

"Hi!" Bea introduced herself to Emma happily, "It's nice to meet one of Big Sis's best friends."

Emma smiled at that, then turned her head so she could now face Rebecca instead of Beatrice. "She calls you Big Sis?"

"All my siblings do," Rebecca answered, "I blame my mother. She's the one who got them to start calling me that, and they use it so much to the point where I think they forget my real name sometimes."

"At least you're not my sister," Emma joked, a grin seeping in on her face. "I still can't believe Dad wanted to name her Yu. Never woulda guessed she's your sister, Reb, but now that I look more, you two do look alike."

"Really?" Rebecca and Beatrice said at the same time, looking and sounding a little shocked over Emma's words.

"Everyone says we don't," Rebecca said, laughing a bit at the irony. "I get that I look like our mom and Bea looks like our dad."

"Well, you definitely look like both," Emma commented, "Although I agree that Bea looks like your dad, with the exception of you both having your mother's head shape."

"Everyone in our family has that head shape," Beatrice added, "It's something we all share. Guess we lucked out."

Just as Emma was about to respond with a lighthearted joke, they heard the other girls all calling them over from the other end of the field.

"Rebel, Em, get your butts over here stat, or else I'll tell you my dad's strange jokes!" Kara yelled, cupping her hands to act as a bullhorn when amplifying her voice. "I'm counting down now! Five..." She began counting downwards from five, patiently waiting for Rebecca and Emma to come over to where she and the others were.

Rebecca rolled her eyes at Kara's harmless threat and gathered her sister and Emma, walking back over to the other end of the field with them as Kara slowed down her counting to give them some more time.

"Four..."

"We're coming!" Emma yelled, sounding put up with Kara's impatience.

"Three..."

"Did you even _hear _her?" Jade hissed at Kara, who looked a little startled by Jade's defense of Emma and Rebecca.

"Two..." They were now only under a dozen feet away from them now, so Kara's counting really wasn't necessary at this point.

"One!" Kara said, holding up one finger. "Your time is up."

"Um, we're _here _already," Rebecca said, "Stop being so pushy."

"Pushy?" Kara questioned, smirking. "At least I'm not a former mean girl!"

"Can you two stop fighting?" Maddie barked. "Is that too much to ask?"

"Fine," both girls rolled their eyes at the question, sounding a tad displeased that neither of them had won the trash-talking match that Maddie had stopped.

"And you see, I have a little game plan," Maddie continued, "It's simple. We'll all practice our own acts at home by ourselves, and tomorrow, we'll meet up in the auditorium a little before school, if Kara and Kailie's aunt will let us. Whaddya say, Kaye, would our Aunt Manon be okay with us coming to school early and using the auditorium?"

"Oh, yeah, if anything, she'll let us in at lunch too," Kara affirmed, "Don't tell my mom's sisters, but she's the most fun one out of all my aunts."

"Operation: Talent Show is a go!" Maddie cheered.

* * *

Maddie and Emma arrived home to discover that everything was surprisingly quiet, a shock due to how loud their family could be sometimes. Walking into the living room, they found their dog Spot and Adrien on the couch together, watching a rerun of Sailor Moon on the TV. Being the geeky anime-lover she was, Maddie had one of her fangirl attacks and jumped straight on the couch to sit down and watch it with her father.

"Ooh, Sailor Moon is on?" She asked, sounding rather perked up to watch it. "Let's see who Usagi punishes this time!"

"You two are so nerdy," Emma scoffed. "But I guess I'll watch it too." She took a seat right in between Adrien and Maddie, setting Spot on her lap.

A half hour and three bags of microwaveable popcorn later, the current episode of Sailor Moon had ended, and Emma had decided to go upstairs and practice her piano skills.

Sitting at her piano for what had felt like an eternity, Emma gently pressed one of the keys multiple times, trying to come up with an idea for her song. Sure, she was only doing piano in their act, but she carried the second largest part after Rebecca did. Darn Jade and her amazing violin skills that'd made her job far easier yet with all her experience. She heard someone knocking on the door, but before she could give a stamp of approval and allow said person in, they entered on their own. It was no other than Maddie who'd walked in, deciding to give an encouragement and reassurance talk to her older sister.

"Feeling stuck?" She asked. "Man, do I know how that feels."

"Don't we all?"

"Kinda," Maddie shrugged, "Although I'd say your case is a bit more complicated than mine was."

"Why don't you try?" Emma offered. "Just for the fun of it."

"Okay." Maddie sat next to Emma at the bench at began to try, and much to her own surprise, she was naturally good at it despite not ever taking a single lesson.

"You're actually quite good!" Emma complimented. "Even _I _was awful after taking 10 classes a month, but you got it straight off the bat! Nice job, Mad." Emma smiled.

"Thanks," Maddie grinned, "Although I think that I'll just stick to ballet and baking. Truth be told, I'm only doing the KLM act for my Kitchen Sink sundae."

"Called that from the start, you'd never sit through a session full of Kara and her cheesy jokes," Emma agreed, pointing out something that they both knew and saw eye-to-eye. "I love her and all but her jokes can be really irritating sometimes."

"True," Maddie nodded, "I've gotta go do something then I'm gonna go to sleep, see you tomorrow, Em!"

"Same!" Emma waved. After Maddie had left and went to her room, Emma decided to begin again on her piano act.

"Back to work..."

Three hours and each finger having cramps and being achy later, Emma still hadn't figured out what she wanted to play as a background on the piano for their act. Tapping her fingers on the keys gently enough so they wouldn't make a note play, an idea struck Emma and she walked over to her desk, opening up her video chat feature. There was a select list of contacts, yet with everyone that Emma talked to or knew personally. The person she needed right now to talk to about her minor issue was her mother, even though she was in another city for the day. Clicking Marinette's name inside her contacts, Emma waited patiently for it to process fully so she could explain her tricky innuendo to her mom.

The cause of her computer's buffering issue, Emma pulled her phone out of her purse, messaging her new friend Kayla.

_hey, can i talk 2 u? it's important_

Hitting the send button in order to shoot the message Kayla's way, she responded not even 10 seconds later.

_kk: ok, wht is it?_

_ea: do u ever feel like you're stuck where you are, and no matter how hard you try to push forward, u keep going backwards?_

_kk: um... i guess?_

_ea: that's how it is for me with my piano act. i know i'm capable and that i can do it, but there's nothing there to push me past my limits and do the best i can._

Kayla took a little longer to respond the next time, but her words surely made Emma feel happiest.

_kk: then, go for it! you never know how much you're capable of until you try. i mean, you're the daughter of our city's old superheroes and the most famous fashion designers in the world, so i **know **that you can think up a piano tune quick. just do it. :)_

Emma smiled at her new friend's remarks, then kindly thanking her for the words.

_ea: thx, grl! :)_

_kk: ur welcome! np, i got your back in this . ;)_

_kk: no joke, i gotta go to bed rn. helping my dad with his videogames wears me out big time. peace out, em. see ya tomorrow._

Emma smiled at Kayla's last message before setting her phone down topside down, turning it off. The small little period of perfect silence she experienced briefly was interrupted by her video chat finally loading completely, the familiar face of her mother appearing on the screen. Emma's heart beat a little faster once hearing the _ding _that came from her computer, turning her head towards the screen to face her mother.

"Hey, Mom!" Emma happily waved to Marinette, no longer insecure and fearful about her performance and now confident and cheerful, grinning from ear-to-ear.

"Hello, Emmie!" Marinette smiled at her daughter, "Sorry if I sound tired, it's been an extremely long day."

"I can totally relate," Emma groaned. "The seven hours of school today felt, at the least, like seventy. But on the bright side, Kai and I added two new girls to our friend circle."

"Lemme guess, their names are Kayla and Harmony?" Marinette assumed, Emma being surprised by her mother's correct answer.

"How'd you know?"

"Well, first of all, their mothers called me and talked about how excited the girls were about meeting you and that they were thrilled about you four being friends. Second, they're the only people out of everyone in your father and I's friendship circle who's children you haven't met yet."

"Well, that certainly makes sense," Emma agreed, nodding her head, "And I was just texting Kayla before we started talking. What a coincidence, am I right?"

"About what?" Marinette asked.

"Oh, just my act with Jade and Rebel in the talent show," Emma grinned, walking away to take the cup of iced hot cocoa Adrien had offered to her as he peeked in through the door, her voice just loud enough for Marinette to hear her. "Although I haven't heard from them since we all left for our homes. Knowing who they are, Jade's likely helping Sensei pack up her items to set up the shrine with Lilli and her family, while Rebecca is definitely trying to practice her song, but her siblings are totally distracting her while her parents and Sabrina are attending to guests in the lobby. But, hey, that's just a guess."

"And you're probably right," Marinette added. "When I babysat for Chloe and Kim when she had Louis, I was being pulled in every direction by the twins. Not easy to manage," she laughed.

"While Maddie was at ballet class and I stayed at home with Dad and we binge-watched all the Sailor Moon movies." Emma laughed upon the memory of when Marinette was personally asked by Chloe to babysit when she had her youngest child Louis, and how she came home with her clothes twisted and destroyed. Oh, how hard Emma and Adrien laughed when seeing Marinette's expensive dress inside out and backwards, stained with red lipstick, mascara, and so on, while her face had teeth marks all over due to George's strong teeth and his biting habit at the time being. Beatrice had gotten herself into Marinette's makeup bag and put lots on her face, the couch, and even on the rug floors. It was definitely safe to say that she _and _the upper hotel floor looked like a complete mess.

"I looked awful that day," Marinette laughed, a little breathless from how hard she'd laughed at the reliving of that day. "I was so relieved after I got to go home."

"Don't I know it," Emma giggled. "But, back on topic, I think I've figured out a new tune for my piano act." She said as she idly stirred the ice cubes in her Ladybug style mug with a spoon-like stirrer with, sipping on the cold drink daintily.

"Then why don't you get started?!" Marinette suggested. "Plus, I have some more fashion business to do anyways. Not to mention keeping my eyes on your little brother at all times."

"Then I'll get started," Emma smiled with a strong sense of optimism, walking over to her piano. "And good luck with watching Lucian. Everyone knows how energetic kids can be sometimes."

"You too," Marinette grinned, "I'll be back tomorrow! Good luck, kitty, I love you!" She warmly smiled as she blew Emma a kiss, the screen going black as she signed off for the night.

Emma smiled at that before slurping down the remains of her icy hot chocolate, then setting the cup onto her nightstand and walking over to her piano and taking a seat on the bench, beginning to practice and test out some potential melodies for their song.

Three more hours later, Emma had finally discovered the perfect one that they would perform as a backtrack for their act in the talent show. She recorded it and had it saved on her phone; all ready to show to the others and Miss Manon for the talent show tomorrow. They still needed a stage group name to use in the actual talent show itself, but she was sure either one of them could come up with what that would be. It was getting late, it already being 10:00 PM, so Emma went to bed in silence.

_'Tomorrow should be fun,' _she thought.

* * *

Kara stood in front of her wall mirror in her red-&-black bedroom, the buffalo-plaid-printed curtains being blown by the wind that seeped in through her opened window. Clearing up her throat, she picked up a battery-powered microphone and turned it on, testing it out before practicing her comedy jokes for her parents and siblings. Being the oldest child in the family came with several perks: Kara had her own room, would be the first one to move out and be on her own, meaning the sooner to start her business with Maddie, and could drive herself anywhere already, since she'd gotten her learner's permit at the end of summer.

"Okay, you can do this, Kara," she spoke to herself with a more quiet but nervous voice, tightening the scarlet-and-peach checkerboard print tie she wore inside her collared shirt a small bit. "They're just your family, it's not like you're doing this in front of a humongous crowd of strangers."

Walking out of her room and into the living room, it being easy yet with them living in a triple-floor house and her room being downstairs, she steeped into the living room with an insecure and slightly nervous smile, shyly waving to her parents and siblings. A minute or so passed, and all Kara had done was stutter into her microphone nervously, letting some awkward giggles slip from her mouth as she put a forced an unnatural smile on her warm sandy-colored face.

"Well," Alya began, folding her hand over her chest as she leaned further back into their orange couch. "Aren't you gonna tell us some jokes?"

"Oh! Right," Kara nodded, feeling a little better about her rehearsal. "Did you hear the one about the insecure bumblebee who didn't want to go out in public?"

"No?" Nino answered.

"Well," Kara started up again, a plotting and devious smile on her face as she got to what she though was the best part of her opening joke. "He lost his stripes, so, he'd be naked in public!" She obnoxiously laughed at her own joke, cackling as she bent over to grab her knees to not fall over.

"I don't get it." Kailie commented.

"Me neither." Alya agreed.

Nino, however, was laughing like a maniac at his eldest's joke, making her smile at her father's amusement.

"Good one, hon!" He said, Kara leaning in to high-five him.

"Glad ya liked it," she smiled, "Now, let's go for another one!"

"So, who was it that stole the cards from the magician: The bookworm, the jock, the musician, the artist, the math nerd, or the Joker?"

"I'll bet on the bookworm." Alya guessed.

"The artist for sure." Nino predicted.

"It was totally the musician!" Kailie exclaimed, wrapping her arms around her stomach with a smug grin.

"The jock!" Kailie and Kara's 9-year-old brother Miles guessed.

"The math nerd!" Their 7-year-old sister Nina said.

"You are... all wrong!" Kara exclaimed, her siblings and parents' faces freezing with shock. "It was the Joker! But don't worry, Batman caught him anyways." That part got some laughs out of her family, it being a better joke than her previous one.

"Now _that _was a good one," Alya laughed, shooting a thumbs-up to her almost look-alike daughter. "Continue, sweetie."

Kara grinned again, continuing her routine with its third and final joke. "Y'know, even though I'm their daughter, there's something I _always _wondered about Rena Rouge and Carapace."

Alya and Nino shared confused looks with one another and blinked, then turning back to their oldest daughter and child.

"Well, what?" Alya questioned.

"Since Rena's attack move was called Mirage, I've always wondered that if when her children were born, she yeeted them out screaming that."

Alya's eyes widened in shock, her eyesight sticking straight to Kara, never leaving the teenager's location.

_"What?" _She said.

"Yeah," Kara nodded, a chill smile on her face. "So, did ya _really _push me out screaming 'Mirage'? C'mon, I wanna know the tea."

Nino's eyes widened at his daughter's question too, as did his other three children's.

"Um, first of all, _no_, I didn't," Alya proved wrong, a stern and displeased look strong across her features. "And why would I scream my hero slogan after that type of situation? I spent nine whole hours giving birth to you, so I definitely wouldn't have the energy to do so."

"Yep, but I was born at a perfect seven pounds exact at 12:00 PM straight," Kara grinned, trying to squeeze her way out of this scenario with her strong suit; making lighthearted, simple jokes. "And I stole you, Dad, and the whole entire family's hearts with my pretty little face."

"True," Alya moved her head up and down, Nino nodding with her. "But that's no excuse for your actions, Kara Christine. Now, go to your room and think about the outcomes of the jokes you've made."

"Fine," Kara sighed as she walked back to her room, sulking with despair.

After plopping back into her bed, Kara looked over to the clock on her nightstand, it telling her that it was 11:20 already. Thankfully, Kara was already in her pajamas for comfort, so she didn't have to worry about that nor being clean since she'd already done everything once she'd gotten home.

Pulling her phone away from her wooden nightstand, Kara almost immediately shot a text to Jade, who didn't seem very surprised by her friend's issue.

_got in trouble 4 telling mom and dad my jokes_

Jade responded quickly, sounding rather arrogant and superior to her friend about the case.

_called it! told u not 2 tell them ur jokes_

Kara rolled her eyes, setting the phone back down before rolling on her side and falling into a deep sleep.

_'At least I tried,' _she thought about her practice run that'd ended up in disaster. _'I'll get a laugh out of 'em next time.'_

* * *

Rebecca breathed heavily as she ran inside the playroom inside the Le Grand Paris, trying to round up her two little brothers and her little sister for bedtime. Who knew 11 and 9-year-olds could be so energetic?

"Guys, slow down!" She scolded, panicking. "If you don't, Mom and Dad will punish all of us." She warned them, although they didn't seem to care one bit about their big sister's alarm.

"Let's play Monkey in The Middle!" Beatrice's twin brother, George suggested. He and Bea looked remarkably alike, with the exception of him inheriting Chloe's ocean blue eyes.

"No!" Rebecca protested. But alas, it was too late, yet with the kids all starting to play the game.

But thankfully, for Rebecca's sake, Chloe walked in from curiosity for what all the noise had been caused from, and she certainly wasn't pleased.

"Kids!" She yelled, sounding displeased by her younger children's hyperactive actions. "How many times have I told you to not do such things this late?"

"I can vouch for that," Rebecca defended her mother's actions, clearly showing that she agreed. "Out of all the times in my life, you've all done this on average, at least 40 times."

"Really? That many?" Chloe asked.

"Meh, that's just how many times in three whole months," Rebecca cleared her words up, explaining the situation a bit better than she previously had. "So if we did all the math, that should be equivalent to... man, I don't know. It's times like this that we really need Jade here to help us with complicated math problems."

"Definitely," Chloe nodded. "Now, kids, go to your rooms and go to sleep."

With that, the kids all sighed and walked out of the playroom and into the hallway, Kim there to help guide them to their own individual rooms while Chloe spoke with Rebecca.

"Sorry that you had to endure all of that chaos," Chloe chuckled, Rebecca smiling at her mother's remark. "I love your siblings so much, but they can definitely drive me crazy at times."

"True," Rebecca said. "I think I'm gonna go to sleep now. Today's soccer practice really wore me out."

"Good, you deserve it," Chloe told her, patting Rebecca on the back. "Jean, make sure she gets there okay. I'll clean this place up."

"Yes, Mademoiselle Bourgeois-Kim," Jean approved, walking over to Rebecca's side. "I'll help Miss Kim reach her room safely."

Chloe nodded before kneeling down to pick up her kids' toys that her scattered everywhere, in piles and lines across the mildly slippery floor.

Walking down the quiet and cozy hallways of the top floor of the hotel, Rebecca and Jean walked side-by-side in silence, up until he asked her a question just before reaching her room.

"Miss, are you sad about not being able to sing a little bit?" He asked her.

Rebecca giggled with an amused reaction to Jean's query for her, then smoothing her long, golden brown hair before giving him her final reply.

"Actually, I'm really not," she said, "I love spending time with my little brothers and sister, it's the best job I could ask for." She said as she went behind a changing screen, getting into her bumblebee-printed pajamas. Walking back out and getting up on her bed, Jean asked one last thing to see if she _really _meant what she said.

"Even better than being a superhero?" Jean presumed, looking a little floored by her reply.

Rebecca smiled yet again, shaking her head as she fell back against her bed's mattress, hands running over her belly.

"That doesn't even come close."

* * *

Vivienne tidied up the hallways of both the upstairs and downstairs rooms of her father's house, sighing sadly at times. When she'd gotten home for the day, she'd discovered some rather shocking news: Marc and Nathaniel had been secretly dating for a couple years now and were getting married in the spring time of next year, which had brought quite some shock to Vivienne, but Brooke and Tori felt the same way that she did, speechless and disbelieving of it. Sure, she'd adjusted to things just fine when Sabrina and Wayhem got married just last year, but her dad being with Marc was different in some sort of way. Sure, she had no problems whatsoever with Marc and basically saw him as another dad to her, but the problem was one person: Brooke. Once it was finally official and the two men were married for good, Brooke would no longer be Vivienne's arch-nemesis. She would be her stepsister.

Yes. It was very hard for Vivienne to swallow, but it was true 100%, the two would be _stepsisters_. From then on, Vivienne was sure that her life would turn into the story of Cinderella.

But she would try her best to tolerate Brooke. Sure, it would definitely be tricky, but Vivienne would do it for her dad. To make Nathaniel happy with everything. And if he was happy, then so was she.

Her session with just her being deep inside her thoughts was suddenly interrupted, just like that. The person who'd came inside the intersection between the downstairs bathroom and the living room along with the kitchen was her other soon-to-be stepsister, Lila and Marc's 17-year-old daughter Victoria, the best actress in the senior acting class.

"Why are you up so late, V?" Tori asked. "After all, we do have school tomorrow."

"Oh, just tidying up," Vivienne grinned eagerly. "Just wanna soak in some more cleanness in this house before you and your family officially move in with us."

"Understood," Tori nodded, "But we should surely try to get some rest. Can't be late for school tomorrow."

As she stood up a little, Vivienne could clearly see Victoria's face from the moonlight seeping in through the window, and noticed something she hadn't before.

"Hey, where'd you get that choker?" She asked, pointing the the black choker that Tori wore around her neck, a reddish charm in the middle.

Victoria stopped in her tracks for a minute, speechless and afraid at her almost-stepsister's question.

"Oh, just something a special friend got for me," she nodded, twiddling with her hair. "Now, go to bed!"

"Right back at you," Vivienne smirked, walking upstairs to her room. Victoria currently slept on the pullout couch downstairs, but it was only for the time being.

Upstairs inside her room, Vivienne looked at Marc and Nathaniel's relationship with a whole new perspective. Maybe, things wouldn't be so bad after all.

* * *

Jade looked over her clipboard with a paper sheet on it, double-checking everything on her list as she helped her mother and Sensei pack up things for the shrine. Her arms hurt and she really wanted to sit down, but the adrenaline she felt from her excitement for beginning her work there in a few short days overpowered the exhaustion.

"Are you _sure _that you aren't tired, Jay?" Kagami asked.

"Yes and no," Jade responded. "I'm tired from all of the work, yet so excited about the shrine opening soon!"

"Well, you've certainly got enough spirit to be a shrine maiden," Kagami said. "Plus, who would be better at helping people with their emotions other than the holder of the Peacock Miraculous, the emotion protector?"

"Nobody other than me!" Jade chuckled, grinning as she pointed to herself. "And if there's anything I learned from watching Sailor Moon constantly, it was the correct way to be a shrine maiden. To this day, Rei will forever remain my second favorite character out of everyone."

"Who's the first?" Kagami said.

"Ami, of course!" Jade exclaimed, a small and happy smile on her face. "Gotta represent my smart sisters."

"True," Kagami giggled. "You really do love any genius characters."

"So much to the point where I went as them for Halloween on certain years."

"Ugh, I'll never forget how much my hands hurt from sewing you your Cure Beauty costume," Kagami cringed at the memory of making Jade's Cure Beauty costume for Halloween one year, considering that Jade went through a huge Smile Pretty Cure phase back then. "But the smile that appeared on your face when you saw yourself in it made all of my hard work worth it."

"I know," Jade smiled, blushing slightly at her mom's words. "Everyone's always told me that my smile could light up a room."

"Just like your father's can," Kagami nodded, sounding a little choked up upon the memories of seeing her husband and elder daughter smiling together, side-by-side, making her realize just how much Jade looked like Luka, yet with their magnificent turquoise eyes and the same nose they shared along with their head shape, but Kagami and Jade definitely shared their short heights, but according to her doctor, Jade would grow up to be at the least, five-and-a-half feet exact. "You two are so similar."

"I know," Jade said. "But in my opinion, I'd say I'm a lot like both you and Dad."

"Hmm, maybe," Kagami shrugged at her daughter's thought, her finger drawing circles around her chin. "But I think you should get some sleep, Jade. I'll finish up everything now, after all, you'll need some energy for school tomorrow."

"Okay," Jade nodded. "Okay."

* * *

It now finally being Friday, the end of the week, the girls all met up at their same location outside the school, sitting by the top of the staircase. They had all been discussing their plans for the talent show tomorrow night, and so far, everything was perfectly steady and civil between the crew.

"Tomorrow night's gonna be so much fun!" Maddie squealed, rubbing her hand together, a strong burn in between them. "I can't wait to eat my Kitchen Sink Sundae!" She said in a singsong voice, looking over to Kara, who rolled her eyes.

"That's only _if _I decide to purchase it for you," Kara excused. "But, touche, my dear friend." The two girls giggled at that, then turning their heads back towards an excited Emma.

"Alright, we need to cease and desist in all directions if we wanna reach the theater in time for practice," Jade said, looking at her tablet, browsing over the schedule that was on it. "I however, am still shocked at the parental units let us come to school at 0645 hours."

"Um... did anyone else get what she just said?" Rebecca asked the others. "I don't speak genius in military hours."

"Basically," Emma began, tilting her shiny black reading glasses up. "She's saying that it's a huge surprise that all of our parents let us come out this early, and to cease and desist means we need to stop being here and leave to do something else."

"Well, about that," Kara intervened, her voice less courageous and more cowardly. "We unfortunately can't practice before school starts."

The others all looked shock, not doing anything else but blink at her alarm. "Why?" She heard Jade ask.

"Because, Auntie Manon and Uncle Chris have a doctor's appointment to go to," Kara told them, "But she's getting us a substitute to hold auditions. But supposedly, lots of other kids signed up online the other day and will verify it once they get here, so we'll have to wait a longer time than expected."

"Well, that sucks," Maddie frowned, "But we'll just wait until after school to audition anyway." She paused for a few seconds, but began to speak again, only doing so to ask three of her friends a question.

"Em, Jay, Rebel, do you three have your stage act name determined yet?"

The three girls all paused and looked at each other for a minute, all not sure what to respond to Maddie's question for them, a very important one at that.

"Nope." Jade answered.

"I went to bed before I could even think of that." Emma shook her head.

"Well... I kinda had one I really liked," Rebecca answered.

"What?" Emma and Maddie asked her at the same time.

"What about La Divas?" Rebecca suggested. "La is the feminine French word for 'the, and there isn't a word that translates 'divas' in French. So, we'll be The Divas!"

"Perfect!" Maddie smiled, giving Emma and Kara high fives.

The girls then all split up for their own classes, but Emma and Kailie went for the middle school like always.

"So, Jade, how's the packing for the family shrine going so far?" Kara asked as she, Jade, Rebecca, Maddie, and Vivienne all walked to class together.

"Good," Jade affirmed. "Although my arms are still sore from carrying so many boxes."

"Relatable," Vivienne sighed. "When my parents first split, I carried so many boxes everywhere when setting up my room at my dad's. Speaking of which, did you all hear who he's with now?" She sounded rather eager and excited to tell her friends about her father's new relationship.

"Well, who is it?" Rebecca asked, grinning like a child.

"You all _sure _you can handle it?" She said, batting the sea-emerald combo green eyes she inherited from her mother.

"If I can handle my father wanting to originally name me Yu, I'm positive we all can handle whoever Uncle Nathan's dating." Maddie added.

"Well," Vivienne cheekily smiled, a light pink blush on her cheeks. "They're actually... engaged."

The girls' eyes all widened fully at that, Jade and Middle blinking delicately as their faces froze in place.

"Alright, now I _really _wanna know who she is." Kara said, going up and down on the tips of her toes.

"Well, it's a he." Vivienne teased.

"Shut the front door!" Maddie and Rebecca screamed in unison, jumping up and forward from their surprise, their heartbeats speeding up a little.

"Come on, V, just tell us!" Jade begged.

"It's Marc." Vivienne dropped the answer like it was nothing, leaving her four present friends in a state of shocks.

"What?" Rebecca said, her blue eyes widening and batting crazy-fast.

"You did not just-" Kara began, too floored to finish her sentence.

"You've gotta be kidding.." Maddie shook her head.

"Brooke's gonna be your st-st-step - _stepsister_?" Jade said, her face paling to a blank white.

"Yep," Vivienne nodded with a sigh, sounding a bit displeased and disgusted at the thought of Brooke being her stepsister. "Unfortunately. I have no problems at all with Marc and Tori, I practically see them as my family, but Brooke... sometimes I want Emma to "accidentally" Cataclysm her."

"You ain't alone," Kara agreed. "Sometimes, I just wanna take her to the top of the Eiffel Tower and throw her off, blindfolded."

"Agreed," Jade said.

"Me too." Rebecca gave them a thumbs up.

"Trust me, girls, I have a _long _list of things I want to do to Brooke." Maddie commented.

"Alright, enough about that," Vivienne ordered. "We all should be getting to class."

* * *

Sitting at the usual lunch table she would stay near, Emma talked back and forth with Harmony, them patiently waiting for Kayla and Kailie to get there. School had just gotten out, and multiple cars with parents near were there to pick up their kids from school, so Emma and Harmony both decided to patiently wait for their other friends to get there.

"Sorry I didn't get much time to talk to you yesterday," Emma apologized to Harmony for not talking to her much yesterday, although the smaller girl didn't seem to mind. "The others were all chatting to one another, and I didn't want to be rude and interrupt them."

"It's fine!" Harmony said, using her straw to stir around the ice cubes in her fruity juice drink. "Kayla's always been really good at talking with people, it's one of her many talents."

"Same with Kai," Emma chuckled, "She would call me at the most random and inopportune times at night to chat with me when her little sister Nina was up all night crying as a baby. Meaning, her family isn't getting sleep, neither am I."

"That's why I'm glad that I don't have any little siblings," Harmony said, taking small sips of her drink. "I'd love to be an older sister, but at the same time, I wouldn't want to get zero sleep some nights."

"That's understandable, but I wouldn't wish that I didn't have my little brother for the world," Emma smiled. "When he was first born and my parents let me hold him for the first time... I just knew that I was meant to be an older sister. Everything just felt so right."

"Aww, that's sweet," Harmony said. "Even if you are a rich child of celebrities, you still have good, well, great morals, _and_ a kind heart."

"Thanks," Emma sweetly grinned, "Not many people have seen me that way. It's like just we're kids of famous people, we're automatically rich, spoiled brats who can't do anything for themselves and don't care about others, like we're selfish. It's nice to see someone who doesn't think of me as that way. Asides from Kay and Kai, that is."

"No problem!" Harmony told Emma. "I'm the daughter of France's most famous actress and the world's best poet, so, I would surely know how that feels. Not to mention being compared to my older sister Maisie all the time. And I just entered middle school while she's a high school senior."

"Yeah, I've been treated that way too," Emma revealed. "But we shouldn't let that shape who we are as people. We don't have to be like our parents or siblings to be amazing."

"You're right," Harmony agreed. "Friends forever?"

Emma looked a little shocked by Harmony's offer at that, considering that this was the only time the two had had a one-on-one interaction without the others there to distract them.

"Yep," she smiled, "Friends." The two then shook hands, their eyes glued to one another's as they both smiled warmly.

"Yo, yo, we're here!" Kailie said in a fun, ready-to-party voice as she skipped into distance, plopping down next to Emma's left on their half of the bench, as Harmony was in front of Emma as Kayla took a seat next to her. "What's up?"

"Oh, nothing much," Emma replied. "Just spoke to Harmony and got to know her better. I have a positive feeling that the four of us are gonna make the best of friends."

"I do too," Kailie said. "We all have so many things in common, yet so many things that balance us out and make us all different."

"Same here," Kayla chimed in, situating her glasses so they would now hold her loose hairdo back. "Before you ask me, I'm wearing my contacts today. So, that's why I'm not wearing glasses right now."

They were all quiet for a little while, before Kayla began speaking and asked Emma a question.

"Hey, Em, did you and your girls sign up for the talent show tomorrow night? My parents and I are going for fun, but if you're performing, that should make it all the more worth it."

"Oh, yeah!" Emma remembered. "I did. Jade, Becks, and I are entering under our stage name: La Divas!"

"Cool!" Kayla said, doing a peace sign with her fingers. "The tickets for the event were way more expensive than one would expect. But of course, you can get in for free if you're family of an act in the show. That type of logic is that?"

"If anything, it's illogical, honestly," Harmony sighed. "But I guess you'll have to just go with it."

Their four-way conversation was then interrupted by a dinging noise coming from Emma's phone, her opening it up to find out she'd received a text message in their crew's group chat, but the feed only consisted of the members of the Miraculous Team so far.

"Jade just texted me," Emma said. "She's telling us to meet her and the others at this location. But sorry, Harmony and Kayla, she said it's only for us. Maybe next time?"

"Sure, that's fine," Kayla shrugged, Harmony nodding to show that she agreed. "We've got our own stuff do to, anyways. See y'all tomorrow!" She shouted as she ran off, heading to where her mother's car was. Harmony walked over to a bus stop, since she was taking the bus to and from school, only for the time being as of now.

"Bye!" Harmony waved as she entered the bus, peeking at Emma and Kailie from the window she sat near.

"Bye!" They waved back, then walking the opposite direction, now heading to what was supposedly a coffee shop, the location where Jade had ordered them to meet her and the others at.

"You think Jade's got a crazy plan up her sleeve?" Kailie asked Emma.

Emma chuckled at her best friend's question, then responding with words that showed she wasn't solely sure.

"I dunno, Kai," Emma shook her head, "I really don't."

* * *

"Ugh, when'll they get here?" Rebecca moaned as she sat at her barstool seat in the warm and cozy coffee shop, drumming her fingers on the table.

"Soon, chill out," Jade scolded her. "After all, it's a bit of a long walk from the middle school to the coffee shop for them, give the girls some time."

Not even fifteen seconds later, the wooden door opened up with a medium push, the little bell above ringing as Emma and Kailie entered the shop.

"We are here!" Emma said in a melodic voice as she took a seat in between Maddie and Jade. "What'd you all call the two of us here for?" She asked.

"This.. is our new official meetup spot!" Jade announced. "Rebecca and I chose on it since we used to come in here all the time with my mother when we were preteens. Not to mention, there's free WiFi and not many people in here, so everything we talk about will stay between us!" She grinned.

"I agreed on it the second she mentioned this place," Kara informed. "Plus, I can totally promote and work on my new website with all the free WiFi this place has."

"You _always _have to get your extra promotion, don't you?" Rebecca teased Kara, who rolled her eye with attitude. "Just kidding! I was like that when I first started playing soccer, too. I would practice anywhere at any time in hopes of being the best in the world. I may not ever get that far, but I'll just try my should do the same, there's no pressure on you at all." She pointed out as she sipped on her vanilla bean latte, letting its warmth burn the tip of her tongue.

"Thanks," Kara said, nudging Rebecca on her shoulder playfully. "After all, it's not what I want to have as a career. If anything, I'll probably end up being a comedienne when I'm older."

"_Please _don't," Jade begged Kara, sipping out of her cup of warm green tea. "If anything, everyone's gonna boo you and throw rotten fruits and vegetables like what happens to the geeky best friends in all the TV shows and movies I've seen."

"Do you really think that happens in real life?" Maddie asked Jade, sipping on her steaming hot chocolate with a tinge of shadiness. "And you're the super-genius out of our group."

Jade went quiet at Maddie's snarky remark, blinking with shock at the elder girl's lukewarm roast. "I rest my case," she commented, sipping on her green tea again before turning her phone and checking out the apps she had downloaded on there.

"So, our plan is on?" Rebecca said. "Because we still need to audition." The section of the cafe where the girls sat at went quiet, as the beating of their hearts rung throughout their ears.

"The auditions!" Jade, Rebecca, Emma, Kara, and Maddie all screamed in unison, jumping out of their seats and making a beeline for the front door of the cafe.

"We'll see you later!" Vivienne said, waving to them.

"Do you think they'll make it there in time?" Kailie asked.

"Maybe not, but they're surely full of surprises," Vivienne pointed out to Kailie, "So, it's a 50/50 vote for me."

* * *

All lined up in the surprisingly long line for talent show auditions, Emma walked in place so she wouldn't grow bored.

"When'll it be our turn?" She whined to Jade, who's eyes were stuck to her tablet as she looked at the school's website, checking the schedule one last time.

"Well, since we're in the Music and Singing category alongside several others of different, we are... number 29 out of 40. And 4 is up there right now." Jade alarmed her, both Emma and Rebecca whining at her piece of information.

"Calm down, girls, just be patient," Jade ordered them. "If you do, time will go by much faster. I bet on it."

Emma and Rebecca rolled their eyes at her response, then taking her advice and calming down a bit, standing straight in their spots with silence.

What felt like minutes later, Rebecca, Jade and Emma were finally at the front of the line, just waiting for the person in front of them to walk off stage.

"Next, number 29, Music and Singing category, La Divas." The woman running the auditions ordered, the trio walking to the side of the stage and eventually reaching the top of it. Rebecca could sweat that she recognized the woman's voice, and it was definitely someone familiar to her. Rebecca's medium light-colored face went ivory white when she saw Lila sitting at the table. Rebecca could feel something in her gut; and unsurprisingly, it told her that they probably wouldn't end up getting in yet with how biased Lila could be when it came to her two daughters, Brooke in particular yet with her being favored over Tori by Lila.

"Begin, Mademoiselles," Lila said, showing that she wanted the girls to begin their auditioning act.

* * *

Vivienne was walking home to her mother's house, yet with her being at Sabrina's home - the Le Grand Paris - on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays, the odd-numbered days of the week, while she stayed with Nathaniel on the even-numbered days. Looking side to side, behind and in front of her, Vivienne saw nothing put of the ordinary. Except something she'd heard from above. Looking above her, Vivienne tilted her head counterclockwise as she saw a tall, thin girl inside a dragon-like uniform, a dazzling choker around her neck. Vivienne could sweat that she'd been the choker before, but where exactly had she seen it?

* * *

"And that's the end of our act," Emma sighed, getting up from her piano and walking to the front of the stage, getting a better view to examine Lila's thinking face. "Did you like it?" Jade and Rebecca stood behind her, Jade holding her jade-emerald violin in her right hand as Rebecca held her golden microphone aka her good luck charm in her left hand, clutched tightly.

Lila looked back up to the girls from her clipboard, a stern and stone-cold look on her face.

"I didn't like it," she began, the girls' faces forming frowns, as Kara, Lilli, and Maddie watched from seats in the nearly empty auditorim, their hearts beating fast. "I loved it!" Lila continued, Jade, Emma and Rebecca jumping up and down with cheers and laughs.

"You're in girls," she told them, putting verification stamps on their tickets that they'd gotten to enter. "See you tomorrow. Viveka, escort them to the hallways, where they'll get their pre-show audition award gifts."

"Got it," Viveka nodded, walking onto the stage and guiding the happy friends out. Maddie, Kara, and Lilli followed them, Lila quickly taking their tickets to stamp them, giving them back to the girls right after.

"Nice job, girls," Viveka complimented them, shaking Rebecca's hand. "You three must be proud of yourselves." She assumed.

"We are," Emma confirmed. "We really are."

* * *

The rest of the day seemed to fly by quickly, and soon enough, it was finally Saturday. The girls had all agreed to meet up again at the coffee shop to discuss everything else one final time, just before the show would start.

Jade pulled out her phone and opened up her messages, clicking on the bar that would take her to the group chat she and the older girls had.

_u all ready 4 the team meeting?_

It was only 9:50 AM on a Saturday, and since people usually slept in on the weekends, Jade didn't really expect any of her friends to respond anytime soon. But, she was proven wrong once Rebecca had answered.

_rk: b there soon, have 2 watch my monsters of little siblings haha_

Kara was next to respond, having a slightly obnoxious but entertaining reply to Jade.

_kl: do i need 2 bring some joke laugh at?_

Her best friend and cousin Lilli was next, sounding rather excited for their last meeting before practicing for the talent show.

_lcl: i'm so hyped for this eeeee! it's gonna be fantasticalicious!_

Vivienne was next, giving an alarm that she'd likely be running late due to some issues.

_vk: i might run l8, the evil soon-to-be stepsister is at the hospital with a twisted ankle_

Last but not least, Maddie was the final one to respond, sounding happy about the news Vivienne had delivered.

_ma: yay! karma really got her this time!_

Jade giggled at Maddie's response, then responding to her with a teasing joke.

_jc: u really dislike her, don't ya, mad?_

_ma: so, she ttlly deserves what she got, she was nasty to others, the universe was nasty to her in turn_

_jc: true, tho_

_rk: definitely_

_kl: true dat_

_lcl: i refuse 2 b involved in this conversation, i shall go back to scrapbooking and drawing, bai sistas_

Jade chuckled at her friends' text feed, then walking over to grab her jacket and black ankle boots before heading over to the doorway. Sliding her phone into one of her backpack's pockets, Jade turned her head towards the staircase and let her dad know that she had somewhere else to be, since a majority of the things in boxes to be taken to the shrine's location were being packed upstairs.

"Dad, I'm going to the cafe!" She yelled. "So, get Mom and Aunts Rosie and Jules to help with the shrine!"

"Alright," Luka said to his daughter. "Have fun and stay safe, Jay!"

"I will!" She promised. "Bye, Dad!"

Closing the door shut behind her, Jade walked down the small set of stairs and got to the sidewalk, making her way for the nearest bus stop.

_'I bet 10 dollars that everyone's gonna be running late **but **me,' _Jade laughed inside her head. _'I love them, but the team would definitely be out of whack if I wasn't on it.'_

After she'd spent several minutes walking, Jade reached a bus stop, and found herself looking to the side to see when the next bus was arriving for her to get on. It was already 10:00 AM straight, and the next bus wouldn't pull up until 10:05, so Jade had only five more minutes to wait for. She heard something ringing from inside her small backpack, causing her to pick it up and search for her phone, knowing that it was more than likely a call from one of her friends. She was indeed correct, receiving a video call request from her close friend and gymnastics partner Birdie, the older daughter and second child of Aurore and Mireille. She hadn't heard from her ever since Tuesday night, since later on, the Acrobat was discovered to have been Birdie after she became Red Robe's prey due to Brooke getting under her skin and making her fired up.

"Hey, Blackbird," Jade said to Birdie, referring to her by the nickname she'd always used for her since the two were five. "What's up?"

"Oh, nothing much," Birdie shrugged. "Just wanted to talk to my bestie before heading back to bar practice. Speaking of which, my hands ache like crap. I now understand your pain from doing it constantly."

"Yeah, it's the worst," Jade laughed. "I'm about to get on the bus to get to the Spots & Tails Cafe, and from then, the rest of the girls and I are meeting up."

"Spots & Tails?" Birdie recognized the name the second it came out of Jade's mouth, her having a bit of a shocked reaction. "Like, that Ladybug and Cat Noir cafe we used to go into with Mama Aurore when we were preteens?"

"You know it," Jade nodded, feeling a wave of nostalgia over the memories she'd made there with Birdie, Rebecca, and Vivienne back when she was younger. Another thing that came to mind, was about how much Jade had changed since she'd last been there, not counting yesterday. "Man, I think we were their most loyal customers."

"For sure," Birdie agreed. "And look at us now. You've gone from being the silent, stuck-up, and snobbish bully into a welcoming, kind girl who's gonna become a shrine maiden in a couple days. And I've gone from being the worst gymnast in our class to one of the best ones there. Asides from you, that is."

"Yeah," Jade smiled sentimentally upon the wonderful coming-of-age experience she was processing right now, amazed by everything she could remember of her old self. "It's hard to believe how many morals I earned ever since I got rid of Brooke and I's friendship. It really changed me for the better."

"Truly," Birdie agreed again, chuckling. "I knew that I was right when I told you that I never got a good feeling about her. But that's in the past, we should focus on now. But I would definitely agree, you really have changed for the good."

Before she could respond to her friend and teammate's words once more, Jade heard the bus come to a halting, screeching stop, a bell ringing from within its walls.

"Oops, I gotta go, see you at the show tonight, Blackbird!" Jade said before turning off her side of the line, slipping her phone into her pocket as she boarded the bus. Taking a seat in the front left row, Jade looked to both her sides and straight ahead, looking forward to what tonight would hold for her and the other girls at the talent show.

* * *

Emma packed up her large tote bag, stuffing it with just about everything she'd need at the show tonight.

Lucky wristband? Check. Comfort brownies? Check. Ring? Check, of course.

"There," she sighed as she zipped her bag up and held it in her hand, solely for the purpose of giving her shoulder some rest. "I've finally finished packing."

"Wow, so that's how long it took you to pack?" Plagg teased. "Even your father took less time than you do."

"Zip it, Plagg," Emma hissed. "Or do you want to go on so I can get Tikki involved?" She threatened.

"Alright, alright, I'll quit it," Plagg backed down, floating a little closer to Emma so he would now levitate just in front of her face. "But you totally owe me come camembert after the show's over."

"I'll get you some _if _Maddie gets her Kitchen Sink from Kara," Emma promised him. "So, chances are quite slim."

"Touche." Plagg challenged her.

Just then, Marinette peeked her head in through the door, making sure to see if her almost-doppelganger daughter was prepared to head for her rehearsal and meeting at the cafe.

"You ready, Em?" She asked. "I got a call from your Aunt Kagami, she said that Jade called her, and she's been waiting for everybody since 10:20."

"Well, what time is it now?" Emma asked her mother.

"12:35," Marinette answered, chuckling. "So, she's been quite patient with you and the girls."

"Surely," Emma agreed with her mother. "Jade's patient, intelligent, kind, talented, pretty, what is she not?"

"Nothing short of what you listed," Marinette affirmed. Ever since Jade had been born, Marinette and Adrien had took the honor of being Jade's official godparents, chosen directly by Kagami and Luka. They both felt that they owed Adrien and Marinette as such after the two of them set up Kagami and Luka after Juleka had dared them to do so. And look at how that turned out; resulting for them in almost twenty years of marriage, two beautiful daughters, and great careers. "She's gonna do big things one day. And so will you."

Emma smiled warmly at her mother's comments, blushing a bit from how flattered she felt. "Thanks, Mama."

"Now, are you two ready?" Maddie asked, appearing at the door with her equipment in her hands. "Jade's getting more frustrated by the minute and could combust from anger if we don't get there soon." She said, tapping her wrist like it was a wristwatch, but there wasn't anything there.

"We're coming!" Emma and Marinette said in unison, their blue eyes fluttering.

* * *

"Alright, let's do a short recap of everything that has happened this week and how we're here now," Jade said as she held out a pointer, pointing to drawings and locations on her whiteboard. "One: We became superheroes on Tuesday."

"Shh!" the other girls all scolded, making her be quiet since there was others in the shop and they didn't want to risk their secret idenitities being outed to everyone.

"We can't let any others find out our other sides," Rebecca reminded her. "Think a little harder."

"Geez," Jade hissed angrily. "Take your chill pills, Beck."

Rebecca merely rolled her eyes at Jade's remarks, a little fed up with her short-tempered friend's current antics.

"And we are all now friends, right?"

"Right." The other girls all answered.

"Two: We found out about the talent show and I gave Emma some new perspective with Sensei and I's made-up tradition, and I must say that I did my job great again, as always," Jade grinned.

"Three: We met Kayla and Harmony and made two new friends out of, not to mention we finally signed ourselves up."

"And four, we got in and discovered our new team headquarters and meeting location."

"Alright, thanks for stating the obvious, Sherlock," Kara joked in a sarcastic voice. "And since it's already 2:45 and the show starts at 5:00, we should go to the school and begin practicing. "

"Right," Jade said.

"Operation: Talent Show is officially beginning!" Maddie cheered, the other girls letting out happy cries of excitement alongside their leading lady.

* * *

"Does my makeup look okay?" Rebecca said as she applied red liquid lipstick delicately to her naturally peachy lips, being careful to not smudge anything. "Be honest, Em, does it?"

"Don't worry, you look great!" Emma reassured Rebecca, who was overflowing with nerves as she put makeup on prior to their performance. One thing that they'd unfortunately found out last minute was that the acts wouldn't perform in order of audition numbers, but in alphabetical order. There weren't many performances that had groups or people with stage names that began with L, and luckily enough, theirs was the first in the "L" category. Jade had felt lucky and relieved about that, since after hours and hours or practice for the shrine, she now believed, unlike the others, that people earned their good luck from something important to them, like a good luck charm. Emma took the wise girl's word for it, and kept that thought in her head whenever she felt nervous since hearing that on Wednesday in their way to Jade's house.

"Really?" Rebecca said, smiling worriedly. "Good, because if this is the best I can do in under five minutes, I'm gonna have to speed up my pace to look good enough. Only one last thing to finish and... there! Done! Perfecto." She grinned from ear-to-ear as she ran her comb through her golden hair, smoothing it out hurriedly before styling it into a sleek side-fishtail braid.

"Girls," Jade said, coming into the dressing room with her violin in her left hand, the bow in her other. "We're on. Follow me."

Emma's heart began beating rapidly, her feeling lots of nerves come to her as the three girls got closer and closer to the stage. Once they were waiting by the left side of the stage, with Maddie, Kara, and Lilli sitting there after finishing their act, being there to cheer on their friends, Maddie whispered some words of encouragement in her little sister's ear.

"Remember, Em," she began, "I talked to Rebecca and Jade earlier, and they both agreed that this act isn't about them. It's about _you_. They're doing this with you because they know you need somebody to stand behind you and assist you on the way, and that's why you should be brave. Go out there and blow 'em all away, Emmie."

Emma's face emerged brightly with a warm smile, and on a reflex, she pulled her sister Maddie in for a hug. "Thanks, Mad," she started. "And you and your girls did great too."

After they pulled away, Jade decided to politely make sure Emma was mentally and physically prepared to enter the stage, but of course, didn't interrupt her embrace with Maddie.

"Ready, Em?" Jade said. "It's our turn. "

You've got this, girl." Rebecca agreed, encouraging Emma from where she stood behind Jade. "Go out and break everyone's legs. With you in this group, we're guaranteed a spot in the top three for sure."

"Yeah," Kara agreed. "Go out there and knock 'em all dead, Ems."

"Thanks, girls," Emma smiled. "It means a bunch. And I'm ready for it, let's go."

Emma held her head up high to the sky as she entered the side of the stage, getting ready to play her piano as part of the La Divas's act. Even if she wasn't Rebecca in the sense where she was singing the main song, she still carried an important part in the number.

And she _loved _that part.

Viveka began to introduce them, smiling to the audience. Yes, she looked at all of them, but her eyes were stuck to where Adrien and Marinette sat together in the front row, their son Lucian on his mommy's lap as Tom and Sabine were right next to them on the left. Alya, Nino, Rose, and Juleka along with their younger children and Kailie were three seats' distance to the right, as Aurore and Mireille took that seat along with Birdie. Vivienne was helping out with the lighting team backstage, so she didn't have the time to go out and sit in the audience.

She began her introduction for them, sounding proud and happy for them. "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, please welcome, La Divas!"

* * *

All 9 acts that had made it into the talent show - yes, only nine out of forty made it in to the actual competition due to some acts being too ridiculous to even enter - sat backstage, all waiting for Viveka to call them back out to announce the three finalists.

"So, do you think we made it into the top three?" Lilli nervously asked Maddie and Kara, them being silent for a second or two to think thoroughly.

"Maybe," Maddie shrugged. "But at the same time, everyone else was pretty good. Even Raye. But as expected, Gawain made a huge fool out of himself yet again, like he's always done."

"Preach that," Kara agreed, defending her best friend's words. "He's been in the same classes as us since second grade but hasn't changed one bit. I've always had this feeling that Gawain and Brooke would get along great."

Jade, who leaned against a wooden prop a few feet diagonally away from them, choked on the ice water she'd drank out of a plastic cup when hearing Kara's wicked yet funny and accurate remark, having gotten the water from a nearby machine.

"That may be rude, but it's also incredibly true," Jade nodded, her eyes still wide from shock. "If they teamed up, the school would become the literal Underworld."

Just before someone else could add something in, Viveka spoke from where she stood on stage, everyone able to hear her voice from the backstage speakers.

"Acts, please make your way to the stage for the finalists'," she began. "I repeat, please retreat to the stage for the announcement of our finalists."

"That's our cue," Emma sighed. "Let's get going."

Walking out to the stage, all the contestants, including the acts with more than one person stood in silence, waiting patiently for Viveka to begin announcing the three finalists.

"Alright, audience, you voted through the school's app on the small devices, and we shall now see who our three competing contestants are," Viveka began as she breathed in and out between breaks, clutching her microphone tightly. "Are you all ready?"

"Mm-hmm," the audience answered, all nodding their heads up and down.

"Our remaining acts are..."

"Kara Lahiffe, Maddie Agreste, and my wonderful little sister Lilli Couffaine-Lavillant as KLM For Laughs, for the Comedy/Humor/Parody category," Viveka announced. "Make your way to the front of the stage, girls."

Maddie, Kara, and Lilli all walked forward, holding hands as they shakily walked.

"Our second contestant is..." Viveka started, doing a dramatic pause in order to tease both the audience and the anxious acts. "Simon DoMaye as Tuxedo Magic, in the Magic category."

Simon walked to the stage, although nobody the the theater, even the ones clapping for him, seemed surprised by his spot in the top three. After all, he was tremendously talented when it came to magic acts and could do it all, without a doubt having a unique talent.

"Doesn't his stagename sound really... I dunno, Sailor Moon to you?" Alya whispered into Marinette's ear from the audience, both women giggling at the humor. Nino and Adrien shared confused glances with each other over their wives' mysterious laughter, innocently shrugging at the situation.

"And our third and final act in the finals is..." Viveka paused her sentence up again, but this time, it was to build up suspense and tension between both the audience and the acts that still remained.

"Rebecca Kim, Jade Couffaine, and Emma Agreste as the La Divas!" Emma's heart began to beat faster and faster at that, feeling completely happy and relieved that she and the others had _actually _gotten in!

"All other acts, make your way back to your dressing rooms, while finalists, stay here and wait until we get the results of who our champion is." Viveka said as she held her microphone close to her mouth, but not too close and not too far.

Once Viveka was out of eyesight since she'd walked to go check out the results - and find out who the winner was in order to announce it to the audience - Emma, Rebecca, and Jade all had a short celebratory conversation with one another, as Maddie, Kara and Lilli congratulated them as well.

"I can't believe it, girls!" Jade practically squealed, happy tears streaking her face. "We did it. We _actually _are in the top three." She croaked as she covered her mouth and nose with her cupped hands. Waving to where their mothers were, within the four fronts rows of the audience, all the girls including the comedy trio happily waved to their mothers, as Marinette blew Emma and Maddie kisses, Alya winked and gave Kara a thumbs up, Rose and Juleka clapped for Lilli, Chloe fist pumped and grinned in a showboating but proud way to Rebecca, and Kagami warmly smiled at Jade, who only cried of her happiness even more.

Viveka came back out around a minute afterwards, holding an envelope in her hands that would reveal her the order of winners, from third to first.

"Alright, everyone," Viveka started her monologue one last time, for good just before she would reveal the end results of the contest ans award the large trophy to the first-place winner. "And the results are..."

"With a overall statistics percentage of 21.5%, your third place winners are... KLM For Laughs."

Even though they'd lost, Maddie and Lilli still remained positive and held their smiles. Kara however, was disappointed and frustrated about getting third place.

"Don't worry girls," Viveka reassured them. "You still did a great job out there. Give them one final round of applause, people!" She cheered out to the pumped-up audience, making them all clap for the humor trio once more before they went back to their dressing room.

"And, our first place winner, the champion of this year's contest with 48.8% is... La Divas!" Viveka announced, the audience standing up as their thunderous applause echoed off of the hollow walls of the auditorium. Rebecca excitedly jumped up and down and squealed and giggled to express her happiness, Emma stood frozen, the sound of her heartbeat ringing through her ears as if it was the only thing she could hear, while Jade only cried even more.

Meanwhile, Marinette, Chloe, and Kagami came running onto the stage, hugging their daughters with all their might until the girls couldn't breathe.

"Um, I think we're human too and need to breathe, Mom," Rebecca joked, Chloe pulling away after realizing she was crushing her daughter.

"Sorry," Chloe apologized, playing with her own fingertips nervously. Emma and Jade were still being squeezed to death by their own mothers, but those moments were interrupted when Viveka came in and handed them their prize money and the winners' trophy.

"Alright, girls," she began, "Here's your trophy and $3,000 worth of prize money in cash, use it sparingly."

Emma smirked at that. showing that she had a great idea of what to use a part of their award money for.

"Maddie, you wanna go to the ice cream parlor and get yourself your Kitchen Sink?" She offered, giggling.

Maddie smiled happily at that, her face beaming with excitement. A somewhat embarrassed blush on her face, she leaned towards Kara, whispering something in her ear that the other girls couldn't seem to figure out.

"Oh, Kara!" She said in a song-like voice, waving a 30 dollar bill in the air. "Wanna get me some ice cream with this baby?"

Kara puffed and sighed angrily, her face heating up with frustration before she gave in to Maddie's playful trick and agreed to it.

"Fine," she sighed. "You win. I'll buy it for you."

"Yay!" Maddie cheered, jumping in the air before giving Lilli and the others high-fives and heading for the auditorium door.

"They'll never change," Jade laughed as she, the other girls, and the parents and younger siblings, Rebecca nodding with a smile in agreement.

"Yeah, maybe," Emma pointed out. "But I love them just the way that they are."

* * *

Sitting inside their favorite ice cream parlor Sweet Scoops, that just was around the corner and behind the school, the Miraculous Team patiently waited for their orders to be brought to the table. Surprisingly, everyone's parents had all agreed for the kids to go there on their own, since they were all trustworthy enough and they had the younger children to deal with.

"Nice job on your win, Em!" Kailie congratulated her best friend with a cheeky grin, nudging Emma's shoulder as she blushed from feeling so especially flattered. "You really deserved it."

"Yeah," Jade smiled. "You really carried out the act out there. Sure, Rebecca sung and I did my violin, but your piano skills surely caught everyone's attention."

"Thanks, girls," Emma grinned, sipping on some ice-cold water. "Glad to hear that from you all!"

"It's totally true," Maddie warmly smiled, running her hand over Emma's. "Even if I got third and this medal, I'm still happy for you."

Emma grinned at that and turned to where Vivienne sat on Kailie's side, since she sat right in between both Kai and Emma. Vivienne smiled at Emma as her pencil-like marker danced across the sheet of blank white paper on her sketchbook, painting out drawings of her favorite places in the city. You had their school, Spots & Tails, Andre's ice cream stand, Lilli and Jade's grandmother's houseboat that they would hang out on at times, and the Eiffel Tower and along with the Louvre.

"What's that?" Rebecca asked Vivienne from her side of their booth, leaning over and peeking at her best friend's artwork.

"Oh, just some cute little sketches of my favorite places in the city," Vivienne warmly smiled, looking up for a brief minute to answer to Rebecca. "I'm working on the hotel and my dad's house right now." She turned her sketchbook around for Rebecca, Kara, and Maddie to see, and they all kindly complimented her and showed interest in her artwork.

"Nice," Kara smiled, looking impressed. "My own self-portrait that I made last year in eighth grade looked like it was made by a monkey that dipped its face in paint."

Maddie giggled at Kara's comments, remembering back when their old Art teacher had wanted everyone in class to design a self-portrait of themselves for class and return it on Monday. Kara, being the perfectionist and hard-worker that she was then and still is, was livid when she saw the final result of her own drawing, begging her parents for her to stay home on Monday and fake being sick so she didn't have to tackle the embarrassment of people seeing her own horrendous artwork.

"I highly agree with that statement," Maddie nodded, taking a sip of some orange juice she'd gotten from the parlor's vending machine. Kara elbowed her hard in the chest for that, but Maddie didn't seem to mind her best friend's actions.

"Here you girls go," their waitress, whom they knew as Natalie, Jagged Stone and Penny's older daughter told them, setting down a tray with everything they'd purchased in the middle of the table. The reason they all knew her person was because, when Jade was younger, Natalie had always worked as a babysitter for her when Luka and Kagami were occupied with other things, as a returned favor for Jagged Stone having Luka as his main guitarist before he became famous on his own. "Enjoy. And Maddie, you were definitely correct in your bet." Natalie whispered in Maddie's ear, saying it just loud enough for the other girls to hear her.

"Ha!" Maddie cackled, yelling into Kara's ear as the taller girl sulked. "See? Even our friend's babysitter agrees!"

"Whatever," Kara rolled her eyes, but Maddie was all too focused on swallowing down her gigantic sundae.

"Um, Kaye," Rebecca said as she poked Kara's hand with her finger, "Look at Mad."

Kara turned her head to the right, only to witness Maddie devouring her Kitchen Sink sundae, starting with the sugar and waffle cones that were on it, then shoving the ice cream itself in her mouth, rainbow sprinkles stuck in between her teeth. She had whipped cream everywhere, from her nose to her chin and mouth, even on her forehead and cheeks.

"Girl," Kara began. "Are you eating or just breathing in that sundae?!"

"Both," Maddie answered, popping the three cherries on the top into her mouth, all at once. "And mind your own business."

"No offense, Mad, but I agree with Kara here," Emma said. "Don't overeat and give yourself a stomachache."

"Pfft, I won't get one!" Maddie denied that what her little sister said was true, but it turned out that she'd spoken too soon. "Yikes..." Maddie hissed as she gripped her lower stomach with her hands, wincing as the pain hit her, little by little.

"You spoke way too soon this time," Rebecca joked, Maddie shooting her a frightening death glare.

"Believe me now?" That was all that Emma could say right now.

* * *

Simon pouted outside the balcony at his large house that connected to his room, screaming from anger about his loss in the talent show.

"I knew it!" He yelled. "Brooke was correct, that Emma doesn't care about anything but her winning!" At this point, one could swear that his normally close-to-snow ivory face was as red as Nathaniel and Vivienne's hair, that was how mad be had became after Brooke convinced him that Emma had set everything up for her to win, same with Viveka and the audience.

"It's all her fault," Simon muttered, hissing viciously as he tightly clutched his magic wand in his hand.

"Ah, I sense a great emotion of envy and disappointment, a perfect target for my Fangs," Red Robe announced from within his lair, reaching for one of his bats that hung above a pole and holding it inside his hand. "I think I may have just found my newest victim."

After the bat had flown away and head for Simon's house, Red Robe seized the opportunity at just the right time, when Simon's emotion negativity level was at its peak.

As the bat bit his wand and filled the insides of it with its soul, Red Robe spoke to Simon in a menacing way, granting him a dangerous, deadly power.

"I am Red Robe, and you, my friend, are now Spellbinder. Since you've felt wronged by your rival Emma Agreste, or as I may know her, miss Kitty Noir, I shall give you the power to spell everything into being it the way you want it to be!"

"Got it, double R!" Simon agreed to Red Robe's sinister offer, letting the vampire bat's magic at surrounded itself inside the bat take over his body, transforming him into a villain that looked like a corrupted version of Tuxedo Mask from Sailor Moon, but harmful and villainous instead. Holding his wand in his hands firmly, Spellbinder jumped from his balcony all the way to the top of a small-large building, letting the evening wind's breeze blow his cape.

_'Emma Agreste, mark my words... you **will **pay.'_

* * *

It was just about 3:00 AM in Paris, and everybody in the city was sound asleep. At least, that was until a loud crashing sound came from near the middle of a street, just near where the Agreste mansion was located. Due to being a heavy sleeper that rarely got woken up, Maddie didn't seem to hear the noisy booms and bangs that Spellbinder caused, and surprisingly, neither did Emma. But Plagg, however, was first to alert Emma about it, since she woke up easily. And he would definitely know, considering the struggles she caused for her parents only during the first three months of her life.

"Emma! Emma!" Plagg yelled as he gently flicked her in the shoulder and lower neck, trying everything he could to wake her up so she and Maddie could get into action. "Wake up! There's a new villain on the loose!"

Emma never opened an eye or made any movement in the beginning, but as soon as she heard the word 'villain' spill from Plagg's mouth, she immediately jumped up out of the position she slept in, her heart's movement speeding up by the second.

"There's a villain on the loose?!" She asked, her back-and-forth pacing becoming more rushed. "I've gotta go get up Maddie and Tikki, they'll know what to do." She said hurriedly, running over to her bedroom door and unlocking it, going down the hallway and heading for her sister's room. Tikki greeted them at the door, making sure both Plagg and Emma knew what was up.

"Emma, Plagg, do you know what's happening?" She asked them. "Red Robe just released another villain, and if we don't hurry up and defeat them, things could go horribly wrong!

"Yeah, Plagg told me," Emma affirmed to her sister's kwami, Tikki sighing with relief when finding out that Emma was fully alert about their new scenario. "Is Mad up?" She asked.

"No," Tikki said, "I'll get her right now."

Flying back inside Maddie's room, it being easy due to a kwami's ability to fly through doors, Tikki gently shook a sleeping Maddie, trying everything she could to awaken the young girl in order to save the day - or night, that was.

"Maddie," she said, poking the young girl's jaw. "Maddie! Get up! This is serious, Red Robe is back and this time, he's got a new villain for you to fight!"

Just like her sister had, Maddie jumped up the second she heard Tikki get out the words 'Red Robe'. Oh, how she already loathed the caped villain deeply.

"Let's get 'em, Tikki." She said, fists clenched as she nodded to her loyal companion. "Tikki, spots on!"

Turning to her mirror, Maddie smiled before playing with her hair and grinning at herself, remembering and looking back on how she used to be, amazed at how much she'd changed ever since becoming the newest Ladybug. But her little coming-of-age moment could wait for later, right now, she needed to focus on taking down Spellbinder.

Walking over to her door, Maddie unlocked it from the inside, being greeted by Emma, who'd already transformed into her Kitty Noir uniform.

"Mads, you ready yet?" She asked. "Just got a call from Kara and Kailie, they're waiting for us."

"You know it," Maddie answered. "And we'll get them on the way. But, how about this time, you lead the mission instead of me?" Maddie offered.

Emma felt shocked at her sister's offer, feeling quite flattered but also stressed out to try and carry the mission. "Me?" she said.

"Yeah."

"I'll do it!" Emma affirmed, smiling.

_'Maybe, this is a sign,' _Emma thought, _'That being a leader is what was meant for me.'_

* * *

"Ya sure they'll get here in time?" Kailie, transformed into her Shellie outfit asked Kara, who stood on their house's roof firmly, gripping onto the roof's ridges to not slide down and fall. Kara tapped her foot gently, not so sure about what to answer Kailie's question with

"Hmm, it depends," Kara pointed out. "If it's Emma leading, they'll be here either on time or early, but if Maddie's leading... they'll be here _centuries _late." She chuckled, fondling with her disguised Miraculous, tapping the necklace's charm gently.

"We're here!" A voice spoke from behind them. Kara turned around to see both Emma and Maddie standing there, both transformed at their alter egos, Ladybug and Kitty Noir.

"Wow, you two are here much earlier than I expected," Scarlett Fox pointed out. "Was an intervention staged?"

"No, not at all," Maddie laughed, slowly losing her breath from how much she chuckled at Scarlett's joke. "Emma led us here this time."

Scarlett Fox looked at them with disbelief, not one bit believing that Maddie hadn't led them to the Lahiffe family's house one bit. "No way," she said. "You're kidding me, right?"

"Nope," Maddie said, popping the P loudly. "And I let her. I don't always need to be the one in the spotlight 100% of the time, she and you girls can always take over at times, at least if you want to. But for now, Em's gonna lead this mission."

"Wow," Scarlett began. "Nice job, Cat. You get to lead all of us this time. Good luck." She wished, Kitty Noir smiling at Scarlett Fox's comforting words.

"Thanks," Kitty Noir started, "But we're not all here yet. Let's go get our Bumblebee, Butterfly, and our Peacock. We'll need their help, too."

"Yeah," Ladybug agreed, aiming her yo-yo towards a larger building in the distance. "Let's go, girls!"

_'Now I get what being a leader is all about,' _Emma said to herself. _'It's about putting yourself last, and your teammates first.'_

* * *

Queen Bee and Wingwoman patiently waited on the hotel's lounge on the very top, sitting on chairs as they tapped their feet and whistled merry tunes, looking everywhere for sight of two things: The new villain they had to defeat, or their teammates.

"When will they get here?" Queen Bee blurted out, breaking the silence with an irritated voice. "We've been waiting forever."

"Not anymore!" A voice said from directly behind them, as Queen Bee and Wingwoman turned around to see Kitty Noir spinning her leather belt that was used as a tail around.

"Ugh, finally," Queen Bee sighed. "It felt like we were waiting for you four forever."

"Um, excuse me, you weren't the one who had to run all the way here from your other parent's house!" Wingwoman said, "Not to mention trying not to wake everyone else up and get busted. At least it's not a school night," she said.

"Alright, enough arguing, let's go get Tropica now," Kitty said. She was really taking advantage of her position as the leader for this mission tonight, trying to make it last for as long as she could. "She's the only one we don't have yet."

"Fine," Queen Bee huffed. "We'll get moving stat."

"Alright," Kitty Noir said. "I'll lead the way."

* * *

"Hmm, Spellbinder's way more threatening than the Acrobat was, and I can't possibly defeat him alone," Jade thought out loud to herself as she stood on top of her house's roof, fluttering her peacock feather fan in front of her face. "I hope the others will get here soon."

Since she'd programmed a wristwatch that could tell her anything she wanted to know, such as the time, locations of her Miraculous Team allies, her heart rate, and much more. Looking down at it, Tropica checked the temperature, time, and the location that she was located at. 3:45 AM, it was 68 degrees outside, and her heart rate was the same speed as it had always been.

"I'll just go to where Spellbinder was last spotted," she told herself. "After all, he could come back there soon."

She bent her knees and sunk to the ground, springing back up and leaping towards one of the late-night buses that head to around where the park was, also where she herself had last seen Spellbinder lurking.

Standing atop the bus's roof, Tropica sat down on the edge, gripping onto it tightly as she kept an eye out for either option: The other girls, the park, and most of all: Spellbinder himself.

* * *

"Where could they be?" Tropica wondered out loud as she nervously fluttered her fan, using it as a technique to try and get rid of her frantic nerves. The sun had already began to rise, and she had made it to the park almost three hours ago, and when she looked down at her watch's time, it told her that it was already 6:20 AM.

"Miss us?" Kitty said as she popped up behind her feathered friend, spinning her baton around at a rapid speed, Tropica turning around as her heart jumped from how she'd became startled from Kitty showing up behind her. "We've spent the past two or so hours searching for both you _and _Spellbinder, but there was no luck then."

"Yeah, but all that matters is we get him here and now," Tropica agreed, but also pointed out the silver lining of the picture. "That Tuxedo Mask wannabe will pay for it. Speaking of which, I wonder who he is."

"Yeah," Kitty agreed. "Hey, maybe it was Simon? His voice totally sounds like him."

"Maybe the Master of Mean, Deity of Lies, our arch-nemesis Brooke tricked him into thinking that Em did something," Scarlett Fox joked. "But of course, we all know she would never do such a thing."

"True," Queen Bee began, "But Brooke's lies are so convincing and believable, so she very well could have tricked him. After all, I'd know, considering that I was her best friend for almost nine years."

"Wow, tell us something we didn't know, genius," Ladybug sarcastically joked, rolling her eyes. "Of course she has a talent for lying!"

"Truth," Shellie added. "I have encountered a lot of liars, bullies, and fakes, but nobody shall ever beat Brooke aka the devil herself."

And just like that, right then and there, Spellbinder appeared behind the girls, wand in his right hand and a deck of cards in the other.

"Nice to see you here, Miraculous Team," he began. "But if I said that genuinely, I would _surely _be lying."

"So would we," Shellie smirked, trying to stifle a laugh.

"Ha, funny," Spellbinder smirked back, clearly faking that he found Shellie's joke humorous. "But I think _this _is much better."

With just a simple swoosh of his wand, his weapon let out a strong breeze of air, making all seven heroines fly back and fall down. All wincing as they tried to grip the ground and push themselves back up, the team looked as he levitated above them, one of the many powers that Red Robe had granted him.

"Time to face your ends," he threatened, raising his wand up in the air to deliver the final blow. But just in time, right at the last second, two figures, one male in turquoise and black and a female in red, black and yellow pushed him out of the way. The turquoise-wearing figure, unlike his partner in red, had fell, and surprisingly, right on top of Ladybug, their eyes meeting awkwardly.

"Um... hey," he said to her, grinning forced and in a rather... awkward feeling.

"Hi." Ladybug cheekily said, blushing as the tips of their noses touched. Maddie wasn't sure what this feeling was, but she definitely knew that she connected to the boy in a snake suit in some sort of way.

"Um, we should probably, um, get up now," she suggested, making him get up and off of her, both teenage heroes now back on their feet.

She stuttered her words when taking to him; yet another sign that she likely had a crush. Why did have to happen to her at _this _time, right in the middle of a fight with a villain?

The girl in the dragon uniform stood with her arms out, a mid-length red cape worn on her back as she spread her arms to the side. Ladybug walked closer to where her team was, standing in the middle space between Queen Bee and her sister Kitty Noir.

"What's happening?" she asked Queen Bee.

"This girl Flamette's facing Spellbinder, and so far, she's kicking his butt!" Queen Bee exclaimed, paying attention to both her teammate and the fighting match that took place in front of her. "But unfortunately, she's only got one of her powers left, and I think it might work."

Flamette swiped her arm, using the section of her cape that'd flown up as a shield to protect herself from Spellbinder's magic cards. When she'd spun back around, the front of her now facing the other eight again, something twinkled in the choker she wore around her neck, causing a light bulb to go off inside Wingwoman's head.

_'It all makes sense now! Victoria is Flamette, that's why she wouldn't answer my questions about the necklace on Thursday night!'_

"Hey, Flamette-" Wingwoman began, getting cut off by Flamette herself.

"Quiet, Wingwoman," Flamette ordered, using a finger to brush a strand of her silky black hair out of her face. "The questions can wait. Right now, we need to focus on taking this loser down."

"Afraid not," Spellbinder devilishly grinned, dropping down his deck of playing cards to act as a screen for him to disappear and reappear elsewhere behind. But, being a smarter villain than the Acrobat was, Spellbinder set off a smoke bomb as well, the girls all coughing and desperately breathing for air.

"Where'd he go?" Shellie asked, still coughing from the fog surrounding everyone.

"Guess that I'm right behind... you, Kitty Noir!" And just like that, Emma felt two strong, large arms wrap themselves around her middle abdomen up to her throat as her breathing become shallow and frantic, while the other girls, and the snake and the dragon outfitted warriors gasped in shock, the mist finally starting to clear up.

"L-let m-m-me gg-g-go!" Kitty Noir stuttered as she felt Spellbinder's arms become even tighter, her breathing now slow, weak, and hyperventilated.

"No," Spellbinder denied her demand, not showing any signs of quitting the hurt he caused her. "I'll just keep on going."

"Actually, no. No, you won't," Ladybug said, pulling out her yo-yo and spinning it around quickly. "Let my little sister go. Now."

"Will there be any... unfortunate consequences?" He asked, pointing his wand out, aiming it right for her small stomach. "It's either I keep her and she gives away her identity... or, I put a giant heat wave spell on the city, and you'll get an ulcer spell and your sister back."

Maddie felt rather challenged by that, but in the end, went with her gut. Literally.

"Give me back Kitty, and I'll gladly take your stomach pain spell and the heat wave." She challenged. "I dare you."

"Alright," he said, releasing his grip on Emma, her instantly running back to the others and now being in the front due to her position as the leader for this challenge. "But, let's turn the tables and give the pain to Kitty Noir instead!" He screamed, spinning around and blasting a spell towards her stomach, even if it would end up hitting the leather of her uniform. But still, the spell went through the material of her suit and hit her right in the stomach, slowly sinking in and bringing an intense pain to both all around her abdomen and her back, getting deeper and deeper. She winced as she felt one sink a little deeper in, but thankfully, it went away a few short seconds after.

"Kit, hurry up!" Shellie yelled, several feet in front of Kitty Noir, who walked with a limp and breathed sharply.

"C-coming," Kitty hissed out, regaining her breath as she ran, catching up with the other girls. Spellbinder had made a run for it when Kailie and Emma had their short interaction, Spellbinder had leaped up to the top of the bakery, standing on the patio as his arm was raised up, preparing to perform yet another dangerous spell. This time, his spell had caused an extreme heating sensation to come down from the sky, as sizzling noises could he heard throughout the city streets.

"Yikes, how'd it get so hot?" Queen Bee wondered, using her hand to fan herself. It didn't cool her off much, but it still worked. "Oh wait, his spell. My bad."

"Don't feel sorry," Ladybug panted, spinning her yo-yo again. "Let's focus on defeating this guy." The heat was still intense and burning her up, but to Maddie and the others, all that mattered was defeating Spellbinder once and for all.

Yet again, he set off another one of his smoke bombs, causing both the insect heroines and their teammates to cough again for air.

"Where'd he go this time?" Scarlett Fox said irritably.

Since the girls couldn't see nor hear one another, they had no idea that Spellbinder purposely threw them off-track so he could directly attack Kitty, one-on-one.

Back in the middle of the park, Kitty Noir lay there, arms out in a "T" form as Spellbinder grasped her shoulders, his grip forming from just under her armpits. Sweat dripped down her face and grunts emerged from her throat, it all to try and breath in and out to survive.

"It's over, Kitty Noir," he said, two of his fingers growing closer together as she reached in for her ring. Tears for fright, anxiety, and determination began to form inside Emma's eyes, a surge of strength ripping in through her body.

"No!" She yelled, bringing her arms up so her hands would now grasp themselves around Spellbinder's neck. "I won't let you defeat me or the others!"

Squeezing the lowest point of the villain's neck, Spellbinder flew back, but Kitty Noir, however, breathed heavier than ever before. The pain inside her stomach went from just a flicking feeling up to a throbbing sensation in her lower belly, but above, it felt like she was being punched by a boxing glove. The heat made her sweat even more, the burning sun's light taking over her body and making her explode in a coat of hot sweat that oddly became cold not long afterwards.

The last things she could hear were the screaming sounds of her teammates for her to wake up, and mostly, an explosion that was likely caused by one of Spellbinder's all-powerful spells.

The formerly hot sweat on her body turned cold, just as the pains in her lower and middle abdomen became stronger than ever, her crying out in pain as tears streaked her ivory cheeks. Her leg muscles constricted as she felt an awful leg cramp hit her lower legs, her body going limp.

And just like that, everything within distance went black.

* * *

Emma woke up to find herself detransformed, laying in a hospital bed with several IVs installed in both of her arms. Her eyes felt overpowered by the lights installed above, but still, she was okay. Shielding herself from the bright lights with her hands, Emma blinked delicately, finding her parents and Jade hovering above her.

"Mom, Dad?" Emma started to speak again, still a little woozy from the heat and possibly the medicines that were being given to her through the IVs. "What happened?"

Marinette didn't say anything, she was just relieved that her daughter was alive and in stable condition. "You fainted from Spellbinder's heat spell, sweetie," she answered. "But none of that matters, all that does is that you're safe."

"Yeah," Adrien agreed. "We're just glad that you're okay."

Emma smiled at her parents' words, but then, she remembered everything that happened earlier, the memories coming to to her one by one. Recapping every single detail that'd happened in their fight with Spellbinder, Emma turned to Jade, her face full of curiosity and confusion.

"Jade," Emma asked, causing the older girl to look up from her phone and face the girl in her hospital bed. "Where are the others?"

Jade's face rose with disappointment and guilt, her sighing before looking Emma in the eyes to answer her friend's question.

"Well," she started off, a sad tone in her normally mature and calm voice. "Spellbinder performed a spell that would transform everybody in Paris into bunnies, and unfortunately, the girls all got caught. And even worse, so did Ladybug."

Emma's face froze in place and her eyes contorted with disbelief and depression, her shaking her head, refusing to believe that what Jade had told her was _really _true. "No," she whispered. "And _bunnies_? Seriously?"

"It did, Em," Jade sighed without hope, unlike the normally positive, confident, and optimistic side of her would. "But luckily enough, Rebecca and I escaped, and Rebecca and Aunt Chloe are both in the cafeteria waiting for you. Our moms, apparently, know a place where we can go to figure out our plan," she explained. "And agreed, but then again, all magicians love their rabbits."

Emma took a few minutes to contemplate her choices, then speaking up again to confirm to her parents and Jade what she wanted to do. "Can you call Aunt Kagami and Uncle Luka in here first?" she asked. "I want to see everyone else again, one last time before I make my choice."

"Got it," Adrien nodded, getting up from his seat to bring in Kagami and Luka, alongside both of the younger children.

"Em, you don't have to say yes if you don't want to," Jade pointed out. "This is _your _decision, not mine, not your parents', not anybody else's. Decide what you want to."

Emma took in a deep breath and held it at Jade's words, letting herself feel like time stopped as she thought the decision through inside her head, looking to both the right and the left sides of her mind; also the two options she had to choose from.

"No, Jade," Emma sighed, taking a second breath that seemed rather forced and overwhelmed by everything. "I _want _to lead this mission. Maddie specifically put me in charge of this mission from the second we began leaving, and I _won't _let her down."

Jade didn't know what to say to Emma's words, she just sat on the couch-like seating that was against the wall and around one corner in silence. "Okay," she muttered, nodding nervously. "Got it."

After the two girls' interaction had ended, Adrien came back in the room, with the rest of Jade's family behind him along with her and Maddie's little brother.

"Hi, Emma," Kagami waved to Emma, who weakly waved back, becoming mysteriously weaker after being fine just a minute ago. "I'm sorry about what happened to you."

"Don't be," Emma said as she began to sit up, her right hand reaching behind her back to massage her back, hoping to soothe the pain she felt in that area. "If anything, Spellbinder's the one who should pay."

Before either Emma or Kagami could say anything more to one another, Maddie and Emma's little brother Lucian hopped up onto his big sister's bed, giving her a sweet little gift he'd gotten with his Uncle Luka inside the hospital's gift shop downstairs.

"Emmie, I got you this!" he exclaimed, holding out an adorable plush cat that had a ladybug print on it. Emma couldn't help but smile widely at that; at just how sweet her little brother was. "I hope it makes you feel better."

Emma smiled at her brother's offer, and so did her parents, all fawning over the little boy's kindness.

"Thanks," she smiled. "I guess that it kinda does."

She paused from speaking for a minute, but then, spoke up again and asked for her to be alone with just Jade in the hospital room alongside her.

"Mom, Dad, is it okay if I speak with Jade alone for a few minutes?"

"Sure," Marinette nodded. "We'll wait."

The adults along with Violet and Lucian all walked out of the room, leaving just the two teenagers to speak with each other alone.

"What was it you needed to speak with me about?" Jade asked Emma, her cerulean eyes laced with concern.

Emma breathed deeply and held it in for a couple of minutes, looking over to the clock to check what time it was. and it said that it was already 4:00 PM, so she'd definitely been unconscious for quite a while.

"I don't know if I'm cut out to be a leader," Emma blurted out, taking a deep breath in and holding it after saying what she wanted to say. "It's... I fell out there and let Spellbinder escape."

"Em, you're more than capable of being a leader," Jade comforted, moving herself close to Emma on the rolling stool she sat on, now directly next to her shoulder. "I know it."

"No, I'm not," Emma sniffled. "When Spellbinder almost ended me out there earlier not once, but _twice _today, I felt that it wasn't correct for me to be the commander-in-chief this time. If anything, that's Maddie's job."

"I wouldn't think that for a second," Jade told her, holding a strangled smile on her face. "Em, you are _so _strong. You never let anything get you down and have such optimism, you were the perfect choice to lead everybody this time."

"Really?"

"Yes," Jade smiled. "And just so you know, Maddie told me something I think you might like to hear earlier."

"What is it?" Emma asked.

"She told me," Jade started, her smile beginning to turn into something that was more genuine and pure; no longer forced and strained in order to try and make her friend feel better about herself. "That she chose you to lead this mission, because you were the one out of our team that was the most capable of defeating Spellbinder. The others all agreed with her, including me."

"Wow," Emma gasped. "I never knew or suspected that."

"Me neither," Jade agreed, chuckling at the irony. "I was floored when she told us all that. Kara and Kailie believed her and agreed 100% percent, but I, for one, was speechless."

"What about V and Rebel?" Emma added.

"They had mixed feelings," Jade alarmed. "Rebecca was totally confident in you and thought you were perfect to do it, but at the same time, was really scared for you. Vivienne was, like me, weighing out the pros and cons of the case."

"Classic them," Emma giggled, playing with her hair.

"Yeah," Jade said, showing that she agreed with Emma's words. The room was scarily silent for several minutes afterwards, both girls' only actions being breathing and looking at each other. Jade was the one who finally broke it, asking Emma her final and most important question.

"So, Emma," Jade started. "What's your choice gonna be: Fly... or fall?"

Emma was all ears at Jade's question, but completely froze in her place when hearing the last part. She'd always heard her mother say that before: When in a hard challenge, you have two choices: You fly and save the day for everyone, or you fall down and do nothing.

Usually, Emma would easily make her decision and get it over and done with. But this time, she had absolutely no idea what to do.

Emma waited a few more minutes to contemplate her answers, making an analysis of everything possible that she could do before making a permanent answer; one that she would have to live with for the rest of her life.

"Jade," Emma started, a brave, confident, and strong tone in her voice. "I _will _do it." she confidently answered as she got up, removing all her IVs since she'd been told by the doctor when her father was out of the room that she could remove them at any time she wanted.

"Great," Jade proudly grinned. "Now, let's go get Rebecca. Ladybug won't be waiting for us forever."

* * *

Rebecca sat at a table inside the hospital's cafeteria, picking at her food lazily as she sighed. It had felt like she'd been waiting in there forever for Emma to finally come downstairs and out of her room, ready to announce her final decision.

"Do you think they'll get here soon?" She asked her mother, Chloe looking up from her phone to answer to Rebecca.

"Hmm?" The older woman hummed. The years had certainly been kind to Chloe; as she still looked young for being a 43-year-old and was in good shape. But, she still hadn't given up the sunglasses she'd worn over her head, them still looking like they were brand new. However, she had cut her hair so its length now reached only to her neck, her trying a new hairstyle by wearing it down. And unexpectedly, she'd fallen in love with it. "Oh, I hope so. Poor girl, having to have that happen to her."

"Yeah," Rebecca sadly nodded, breaking off a piece of bread from her sandwich and putting it in her mouth. "It's crazy to think that she probably wouldn't have survived if I didn't carry her here on my own."

"Yeah," Chloe agreed. "You were a real hero out there by doing that for Em."

Rebecca gently smiled at that, slightly nodding at her mother's words.

"Hey!" They heard a voice tell from the elevator, turning their heads to see Jade running, Emma following behind her. "We're here!"

Rebecca's heart jumped with excitement upon seeing her friends, her hopping up from her seat and running towards them to hug the duo tightly.

"Em!" She gasped, wrapping her arms around Emma tighter, making the younger teen squeak and struggle to breathe. "So happy you're okay!"

Emma gently tapped Rebecca's back, then pushing her off in order to begin breathing normally again. "Yeah, nice to see you too," she grinned, "But what's our plan?"

Emma didn't know what to say to Rebecca at first, but then, in idea struck her.

"Let's go, girls," she said hurriedly, turning around in a dash and heading back around for the door. "I know the perfect place where we can get what we need to defeat this Tuxedo Mask wannabe."

Rebecca and Jade only looked at each other with confused glances, shrugging to each other to symbolize that they weren't exactly understanding of what Emma explained.

But, Jade didn't ask Emma any questions until they were just about the leave the hospital, but of course, their parents had all given them the okay and let them go by themselves.

"Where are we going?" Jade asked as they exited the door and walked down the medium-sized staircase, Emma leading the way.

She remained silent for a few minutes yet again, probably because she was so focused on everything that she was thinking.

"We need to get to the subway station, _quick_," she told them, "We'll need some hand-sewn veil capes."

"From me?" Rebecca asked, pointing her finger towards herself with a puzzled look, as Jade just observed everything happening around her.

"Yes, you," Emma answered. "After all, who else in the Miraculous Team is a sewing genius _but _you?"

* * *

Arriving back to the hotel just for a short and sweet pit-stop, Emma, Rebecca and Jade all walked into the lobby confidently and in a hurry, praying that they'd make it to stop Spellbinder in time. Once they'd made it in, Rebecca walked over to the front desk, Sabrina standing there as she wrote on a clipboard and tapped her pen.

"Auntie Sabrina?"

Sabrina looked a little caught up in her own work, but darted her head and stopped what she was doing the second she recognized Rebecca's voice. Of course, since she was so close with Rebecca and could easily try and predict what she was thinking or wanted at times - her being spot on a majority of them - she passed Rebecca a card key, her gladly accepting it and running up the stairs.

After reaching the room, Emma whispered an order of instructions in Rebecca's ear, then taking a seat on the couch-like bench in Rebecca's room.

"So, what're we doing?" Jade asked. Emma didn't blink and eye at her, however, she just smirked and giggled deviously. "C'mon! You've gotta tell me, Em, I'm one of your best friends!"

Emma gave in, leaning towards Jade's ear to whisper her secret plan to her.

"You remember how in the Sailor Moon theme song, how Moon, Mercury, and Mars wore those cape thingies over them?" she asked.

"Yeah?" Jade answered, still a bit puzzled by everything that was happening.

"Well, Rebecca's sewing us veils that look like those, so we can disguise ourselves from Spellbinder."

"Oh!" Jade exclaimed, an impressed smile on her face, "I like the way you think, Agreste."

"Same to you, Couffaine."

The two girls giggled and leaned a bit farther back in their seats, just patiently waiting for Rebecca to finish up sewing their veils for the plan.

Five or six minutes later, Rebecca cheered with excitement in her voice, thrilled to realize that she'd finally gotten the delicate pieces of fabric they would wear soon done.

"There!" She exclaimed. "They're finished!" Jade and Emma quickly got up when hearing her announce that she'd officially completed her work. Leaning over the athlete's shoulders, they saw her holding three veils, one for each of them.

"They're perfect!" Emma grinned, holding hers up for it to reflect under the chandelier's light that hung from the ceiling of Rebecca's room. Emma's veil was a combo of black and green, perfect to go with her Kitty Noir outfit. Rebecca's was yellow with horizontal black stripes, specifically designed to match her Queen Bee uniform. Last but not least, Jade's was three layers, one of each in sea green, royal blue, and black, made to perfectly match her Tropica suit.

"So," Jade started, holding her own veil tight in her hands. "Shouldn't we just transform already?"

"Right," Emma nodded.

"Plagg, claws out!"

"Pollen, buzz on!"

"Duusu, feathers out!"

Once they'd transformed back into their hero uniforms again, they still looked the exact same as before. Except for Jade.

"Hey, Jade," Rebecca began to ask her a question, a confused look on her face. "Why does your outfit now look different than it did earlier today?"

"Huh?" Jade looked confused as well to Rebecca's question, looking down at herself to see the outfit's full transformation. "Oh. Well, that's surprising," she giggled.

"Maybe it's because you're wearing it as a brooch rather than a hair pin?" Emma suggested. Earlier today, when they were originally fighting off Spellbinder, everyone had realized that Jade wore her Peacock Miraculous as a brooch on her shirt rather than something to pin her hair back. "That could be why."

Jade did take Emma's suggestion as an idea of why and how her outfit looked different. Just several days ago, when they'd fought off the Acrobat, Jade's uniform was a dress that had peacock feathers on and around it, everywhere. This time, she wore a sea blue bodysuit that covered every inch of her, a cute feathery net hairpiece in her hair, but the same peacock feathers from her first outfit surrounded the belt around her waist as a somewhat-skirt. Maybe it was position of where the Miraculous was worn, but this time, Jade actually preferred her new uniform rather than her first one.

"Yeah, I think you're right," she agreed. "But that all can wait for later, right now, let's go save our friends!"

"Alright!" Rebecca cheered, jumping in the air and pumping her fist.

"Kitty, wanna lead the way?" Tropica said, grabbing the cat-like girl's hand and spinning her to the other side. "You need the control and leadership, anyways. Go for it." Jade smiled, giving Kitty Noir an agreeing nod.

Kitty felt shocked and wordless at her teammate's words, amazed to know that she'd be willing to let her take the lead after all the chaos that happened earlier on.

"Yeah," she said, "I'll give it another go."

* * *

The trio of remaining superheroes for this mission jumped and ran above Paris's buildings, being careful, fast, and agile all at once. They'd all been running up there for close to four hours, but still had no luck. Stopping all at once for a quick minute, the action staged only for them to catch their breaths, Queen Bee looked over from where she was on the left over to where Tropica was on the right, while Kitty Noir was right in the middle. They hadn't put on their veils yet, those were all part of their ending plan. And the three girls weren't even close to there yet.

"Hey, where do you think he is?" she asked. "Last time we saw him, we were all down at the park. Surely, he couldn't have went far away."

"Hmm," Tropica hummed, pausing as her finger circled around her chin. "I don't know, honestly. However, I _do _have a gadget that can help us pinpoint his exact location."

"And what is that?" Queen Bee asked Tropica, a teasing grin on her face.

"My Feathered Supercomputer," she answered. "I already had began making it when I was like twelve, but just started finishing off the last programming details three months ago. Finally, it's complete, and what better to use it for rather than my superheroine duties, _with _some special touches?"

Kitty and Bee looked too perplexed when hearing that she'd began making her mini-computer at only the age of 12. But of course, that was one of the many perks of being a child genius like her, of course.

"H-how did you make something so small of such good use so young?!" Kitty asked, flinging her arms out. "When I was a twelve-year-old last year, all I tried to do was open up my mystery box from the summer fair!"

"To each their own," Tropica cockily smirked. "I've known how to solve pi ever since I was 11, by the way."

"Seriously?" Queen Bee exclaimed, sounding a bit frustrated but also amazed and envious over Tropica's genius mind.

"Yep," Tropica said. "But enough about that, let's get moving again. Kitty, like earlier, you're leading the way, right?"

Kitty paused for a minute. Sure, she wanted to lead their way and be the front-&-center this time, but at the same time, she felt nervous and afraid of messing up.

"Um... yeah," she nervously smiled. scratching at the back of her neck awkwardly. "I'm ready when you two are."

No matter how hard she tried to convince them that she was 100% a-okay, Queen Bee and Tropica still saw right through her and figured something was wrong.

"Alright, Kitty, what's wrong?" Tropica asked, holding one of her fans and gently tapping it against her hip as she spoke to her partner.

Kitty was at full attention when hearing Tropica's question, but couldn't find the correct words to say. So, she'c came to the decision that it was better to stay quiet and not answer; and just get back to their mission. But, those strategies and ideas were ended as soon as Queen Bee warned them of Spellbinder's presence. Grabbing their hands, taking one of each of theirs in her own hands, she tried her best to pull them completely out of the way.

"Kitty, Tropica, look out!" She'd managed to get them pulled a bit, but only Tropica was completely safe from Spellbinder's attacks. Kitty Noir, however, was right in the middle of it, just about to get zapped by his spell and turned into a bunny. But because she deeply cared about her and knew that it was her time to shine, Tropica jumped right in front of Kitty and took the hit for her.

Looking down to the ground, Kitty Noir bit back a sob when seeing Tropica changed into a rabbit, horrified to know that she wouldn't have one of her best friends, as well her partner and one of her biggest supporters there to help her take down this clown.

"Ha, perfect, _just _perfect," he cackled. "That's five down, and two to go." Using his wand, he put his levitating spells to good use and made one pick up the bunny formation of Tropica, trapping her inside a cage with Ladybug, Scarlett Fox, Shellie, and Wingwoman. At first, he though about zapping Queen Bee and Kitty Noir too, but, he surprisingly gave them the benefit of the doubt.

"Hmm," he paused, tapping his temple with his middle and pointing fingers as he analyzed the still, statue-like forms of Rebecca and Emma, trying to decide his next move. "I _would _transform you into villains, but I guess that I should try and be fair. See you soon," he mysteriously smirked as he did the same trick that Flamette had done earlier, by flinging up a side of his cape and disappearing like _that_. Sure, that may have not been the trick that she pulled off, but of course, different scenarios need different game moves.

As he jumped away, all Kitty could do was look at him, her bluebell eyes wide in shock, touches of sadness lacing over them. Sinking down to the hard ground of the rooftop she stopped on, Kitty buried her face into her hands and began to cry silently, struggling to breathe again just like she had earlier. All Queen Bee could bring herself to do was go down with Kitty Noir, resting the latter's head on her shoulder for comfort.

"It'll be okay, Kit," she comforted, "We can still try and win. Anything's possible."

"You don't understand," Kitty squeaked out, wiping her tears away from her eyes, but eventually giving up. "_I _was supposed to be the leader here. Being a leader is all about putting your teammates first and yourself last, but no matter how hard I try, I just can't seem to do that. And look at what happened with me taking at responsibility, all of the other girls have been caught."

Queen Bee took a minute to respond back to Kitty Noir, taking in her younger friend and teammate's words. _'Putting yourself last, and your teammates first.' _Oh, how Rebecca knew the deep, stinging and stabbing pain so well.

"Don't worry, I know exactly how that feels," she reassured, making a tiny braid in Emma's hair. "That was how it was for me in my first few weeks as the girls' soccer captain."

"Really?"

"Really." Rebecca nodded. "I always was out on the field at practice, stealing the ball from others any chance that I got and being in the front and center all the time. But then, once they started ignoring me and calling me selfish, I was so, so angry. I thought that they were all just jealous of me because I thought I was better than them, but that wasn't my case at all."

"Well, what was it?" Kitty asked.

"Same as you said. I put myself first rather than my teammates, so in reality, I was a horrible leader rather an a great one. But, the second I started putting all of my teammates first and myself last, everyone began to respect and be nice to me. So, you're right. Your teammates always will come first, no matter what. You really are on the right track, Em."

"Okay," Kitty nodded, getting back up and on her feet. Bending down and grabbing Queen Bee's hands, Emma kindly helped her only remaining partner up, making the elder hero smile. "Thanks, Goldie."

Rebecca beamed at Emma's words and the kind gesture she'd made when helping her up, happy to know that her own words of encouragement had helped Emma find her voice. "You're welcome," she smiled. "And Goldie? Why're you calling me that?"

"Like Jade says, everyone needs a nickname!" Emma laughed, playing with her belt-made tail. "Not to mention your hair color is golden brown."

"Oh, yeah," Rebecca giggled, playing with the small side braid she wore next to her high pony. "But now, are you ready? For reals this time."

"Yeah," Emma nodded, "I really am this time."

* * *

"So the plan I spin my bumblebee yo-yo around really fast and use it as a propeller, and you use your baton as one for you when we fly through the air, then we attack Spellbinder from behind?" Queen Bee asked as she and Kitty Noir ran fast above the buildings' rooftops yet again, racing against time in order to defeat their new enemy.

"Yep," Kitty nodded, "And since she's not here, we'll use Tropica's veil to throw over his face so he can't see us."

"Ah!" Queen Bee exclaimed, an impressed grin on her face as she nodded. "I like that plan."

"Thanks," Kitty smiled. As the two slowed down their individual paces, now slowly walking side-by-side as they looked at each other through their peripheral visions, a beeping sound came from Kitty Noir's baton, her looking rather psyched up to look at it for a reason Queen Bee didn't know. "Oh! We're getting closer to his hideout."

"You put a tracking device on him?"

"Well, somehow," Kitty shrugged. "I just connected my system on here to Jade's supercomputer, and wherever she is, so is he."

"Genius!" Queen Bee complimented. "I never would've thought."

She expected to get a kind and lighthearted response from Kitty this time, but instead, received a hurried and stressed one.

"Yeah, yeah, we're now here at his hideout, we've gotta be quiet and move in."

"Okay," Queen Bee slouched, feeling a little, stung, per say, at her teammate's words.

The two jumped down from their area above wherever they were on a roof and were now in an alleyway, many, many puddles around them, each one making a splashing noise as either one of them stepped in one by mistake.

"This must be the back entrance," Kitty Noir commented, her hand gripping tight around a doorknob as she twisted it, opening up the tall wooden door as quietly as she could.

Soundly tiptoeing their way through the pitch black, cold room, Kitty Noir and Queen Bee patted their hands around everywhere, all in hope of looking for a light switch. Thankfully, after a minute or so of trying, Queen Bee found a light switch, turning it on like there was no tomorrow.

"There," she said, swiping her hands together to dust them off. "Done."

She looked all around her, trying to find Kitty Noir, but she had already scaled her way up a ladder and was waiting for Queen Bee, but being herself, she used her yo-yo and attached it the the top bar of the ladder, using her feet on the sides of the tall, silver object to push her way up.

"Why'd you get up here _that _way?" Kitty asked, smiling with a look of pure amusement on her face.

"Eh, I dunno," Queen Bee shrugged. "Just being a little random and spontaneous, I guess."

"Look!" she shrieked. "Spellbinder's right there!" she alarmed as she grabbed Kitty by the shoulders, pointing and showing here right where their criminal was.

"Oh, that twerp is dead meat now," Emma scowled, making a fist and punching her open palm with it. "He's totally gonna pay for turning our girls into rabbits."

"You know it," Queen Bee agreed, reaching back and draping her black-&-yellow striped veil over her face. "Let's go kick some magician butt, Em."

Beginning to rapidly spin her yo-yo around, it now acting as a somewhat-helicopter for her, Queen Bee jumped down to the floor, landing straight on her feet with her arms in a "T" shape, just like Flamette had done.

"Miss me, Tuxedo Mask wannabe?" she said, hands on her hips as an arrogant grin arose from her face.

Kitty jumped down next, single-handedly spinning her baton. "What QB said," she smiled, eyes closed. "Your time of causing trouble and mischief is up, Spellbinder."

"Never!" He shouted, making karate-chop hands to defend himself from the two teenagers.

Charging towards them, another set of cards in his hand, now using tarot instead of playing cards, Spellbinder charged towards Emma and Rebecca, but they jumped just before he could cause any harm to them.

"Dang it!" He grunted, his body colliding with the wall from running-&-leaping too fast.

Rebecca now stood where he originally had, spinning her yo-yo around in a complete circle.

"Venom!" She then threw her yo-yo up the the air, turning the inanimate bee stinger-like part of the weapon into a throbbing, moving object, its pace and noise moving and sounding like similar to a human's own heartbeat.

"Say goodbye, Spellbinder!" She shouted as she ran towards him, just as he had turned around to face her. Like her father and Uncle Adrien said; timing was everything. Aiming the tip of her stinger right where the red rose was pinned on his tuxedo, Queen Bee bent her knees as she went back to the ground once more. Trying to figure out exactly where his source of power was for a minute, Queen Bee slyly slipped his wand away from his paralyzed hand, throwing it over to Kitty Noir.

At first, she refused to catch it, which confused Queen Bee quite a lot. But after she'd let it fall to the floor, stepping on it as it broke and released another bat out of it, her reaching her arm up to end it all like that.

"Cataclysm!" Reaching her arm up and running towards the bat, Kitty destroyed it and wiped away the very last bit of Spellbinder's power.

And just then, everything went right back to normal. The other girls were no longer bunnies, the bat had been destroyed, and last but not least, Emma had defeated Spellbinder. _On her own._

Getting back up and onto her feet, Ladybug looked around to see what was going on now, relieved to find out that she was safe yet again. Once her sight caught wind of just where her little sister stood, grinning at her with a self-confident and proud wave, Maddie ran over to Emma and pulled her right into a tight hug, Emma beginning to lose her breath.

"You did it, Em!" She exclaimed, making their hug all the tighter. "I know you had it in you."

"Well," Emma began, smiling coyly. "I didn't do it alone. Queen Bee helped me." She announced, pointing over to Rebecca and proudly smiling at her friend, talent show partner, and fellow superhero, who looked rather awestruck and shocked by Kitty's words. But, she just returned the smile back, happy to know and see that Emma had developed herself for the better on this mission.

"You too, Bee," Ladybug smiled. "Also, I didn't tell the other girls this, but it was because I thought I should tell you myself."

"What?"

"When I activated my Lucky Charm, it gave me... a framed speech, made entirely of quotes."

Emma tilted her head at that, not knowing what to say or how to react to Maddie's news.

"Really?" She asked with a confused but still happy smile.

"Yeah," Maddie nodded. "But, after looking at them, I think I knew what it meant, despite being clueless at first."

"Oh, really?" Emma teasingly smiled. "What _does _it mean?"

"Well," Maddie began, the other girls all watching them from where they all stood together in the room. "I think... that it was trying to tell me something."

"What was it trying to tell you, Sis?" Emma asked, a curious look on her face.

"I believe that it was trying to tell me that you really were more confident than you saw yourself as," Maddie suggested. "And maybe it was telling me that I shouldn't always be the leading lady, always front and center. From now on, whatever the villain's strengths are, I think I'll let whomever is the best at taking them on lead."

"Y'know, I actually really like that idea," Kara smiled.

"Same here." Kailie nodded in agreement.

"I'm up for it!" Rebecca grinned, pumping her fist and winking.

"Sounds cool!" Vivienne smiled.

"Spot-on idea," Jade approved. "Nice thinking, girl."

"Thanks, girls," Maddie smiled. "But, since it's already 10:00, I think we should start moving and all get home."

* * *

Emma and Maddie walked together and side-by-side, making their way back to their family's house. Thankfully, they'd called their mother and explained the entire situation, and luckily, she wasn't one bit angry about the time and them not being home yet.

"I know everyone's told you it a gazillion times this whole week," Maddie started to Emma, the latter's head turning so she could face her younger sister. "But you really did a great job out there."

"At the talent show?"

"No, silly, when fighting Spellbinder!" Maddie laughed. "I love you and all, but you and Dad can both be totally oblivious sometimes."

"Well, to quote him..." Emma began, raising her hand in the air and grinning like a manic, Maddie sighing. She already knew what her little sister had to say next, and everyone knew that it would surely make her cringe.

"They see me catwalking, they hatin'."

"_That _is what I mean," Maddie moaned. "You two have the worst jokes."

"And you and Mom can both be lovesick dorks." Emma teasingly grinned, flicking her dark hair behind her.

Maddie blushed uncomfortably at that, only thinking of the boy in the snake suit she'd bumped into earlier.

"Y'know, we're all total dorks at times," Maddie added. "But that's okay, because that's what makes us who we are."

Emma thought about that for a second, not really knowing what to say. Except for one thing, that was. "Yeah, I guess you're right," she agreed.

"Especially us." Maddie said. "Sometimes, I just like to think our family wasn't meant to be normal or have completely normal and perfect lives, anyway."

"Yeah," Emma nodded. "But, I think I can do just fine with that."

"Really?"

"Yeah," Emma moved her head up and down, confirming that what she'd said to her sister was true, her meaning it 100%. "But, I still have lots of the things normal people have. Great friends, an amazing family, a beautiful house, and lots more."

_'And that's all that matters to me,' _Emma thought, a smile wide on her face.

She already had things great, but all that really mattered to her was having the ones she loved by her side in order to have a great future. And that was true optimism.

* * *

**A/N: And that's a cut for the second official chapter. I _know _that Sensei and Jade's tradition isn't real, but it is in here, and like she said once, they made it up, so please, no hating on or flaming me. I will explain how they created it later on in the chapter with Jade as the main focus, which should be number seven. And Sensei's name is actually meant to be a joke, since I watch a show where this person real name sounds similar to their profession that they go by, so yeah, that was a complete joking purpose lol. Also, please forgive me if I got any Japanese words wrong, I'm horrible at learning new languages. The only reason I was able to write a snippet of Rebecca speaking in French was by using Google Translate, so thank that website for my attempt at writing a bit in French, lol. Another thing is, I made Lilli and Viveka have hyphenated last names because since they have two mothers, it felt right to do so for them. As for Chloe, I saw her as the type of person who'd hyphenate her last name after getting married, because she seems stubborn enough to keep her maiden last name but also change it, lol. And news is this: I'm likely going to be working harder on writing and coming up with ideas for new chapters and updating more frequently, so if I can't respond to your review[s], I'm busy writing more for you all to enjoy. I apologize for taking over a whole month to update, but things take time to be just right. I personally feel that this fight scene wasn't the best one I had planned so far, but for me, I'm more so focused on the character development. I also apologize if some parts seemed rushed, and if they do to me, I will definitely be fixing that up next chapter by explaining them through the characters. Lastly, before I go, I have some questions for you all;**

**1\. Do you have any ships between the characters so far?  
**

**2\. Who is your favorite next-gen child out of the main seven?**

**3\. Who do you think will be the main focus next chapter?**

**4\. Who out of everyone's other friends do you want to get a Miraculous and fight alongside them?**

**And 5; What do you think of the new characters' kids that were introduced?**

**Also, one last thing: In chapter five, there will be multiple villains, so, I'm setting up an SYOC contest. The contest will end once chapter 5 is finished for posting, the date of so not being determined/announced.**

**Make sure to read and leave a review, I would love the feedback.**

**That's it for now, everyone! Bug & Noire out! Xo, Syd**


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